File structure for storing content objects in a data repository

ABSTRACT

A data structure and method are provided for storing a content object stored (e.g., a custom compilation or prepublished work) as a group of hierarchically related content entities Each content entity is contained in a separate file object. An attribute file object corresponding to each content entity file object contains attributes pertaining to that entity. A list or outline containing container and noncontainer identifiers defines the content, order and structure of the content object. This list or outline is stored as a separate file object (e.g., a CBO or the PSF file of a prepublished work).

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is related to the co-pending and commonly assignedpatent applications listed below, which were filed herewith on Jan. 21,2000 and are all incorporated by reference herein:

-   -   A System and Method for Creating Compilations of Content Ser.        No. 09/489,134    -   Method and System for Adding Content to a Content Object Stored        in a Data Repository Ser. No. 09/489,576    -   Method and System for Adding User-Provided Content to a Content        Object Stored in a Data Repository Ser. No. 09/488,976    -   Method and System for Moving Content in a Content Object Stored        in a Data Repository Ser. No. 09/488,971    -   Method and System for Removing Content in a Content Object        Stored in a Data Repository Ser. No. 09/489,087    -   Prerequisite Checking in a System for Creating Compilations of        Content Ser. No. 09/488,969    -   Method and System for Preventing Mutually Exclusive Content        Entities Stored in a Data Repository to be Included in the Same        Compilation of Content Ser. No. 09/489,265    -   Volume Management Method and System for a Compilation of Content        Ser. No. 09/489,090    -   Method and System for Calculating Cost of a Compilation of        Content Ser. No. 09/489,143    -   Method and System for Storing Hierarchical Content Objects in a        Data Repository Ser. No. 09/489,570    -   Providing a Functional Layer for Facilitating Creation and        Manipulation of Compilations of Content Ser. No. 09/489,605    -   A Hitmask for Querying Hierarchically Related Content Entities        Ser. No. 09/489,133    -   A Method and Configurable Model for Storing Hierarchical Data in        a Non-Hierarchical Data Repository Ser. No. 09/489,561

REFERENCE TO A COMPUTER LISTING APPENDIX

Appendix A to this application is set forth on a single compact and thematerial recorded thereon is incorporated by reference herein. Thefollowing file is recorded on the compact disc: file name:AppendixA.txt; file size: 107 kB; date of creation: May 16, 2002.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The present invention relates to content management, and morespecifically, to a system, method and program product for creatingcompilations of content from hierarchical content stored in a datarepository.

2. Background of the Invention

Content management systems have enabled content of all types, e.g.,text, still images, moving images, and audio content, to be storeddigitally. Content management systems include, for example, relationaldatabases, digital libraries, and media servers. They have furtherprovided functions for manipulating the content, e.g., searching andediting capabilities.

It would be desirable to enable a user to take advantage of vast storesof content to create compilations tailored to the user's needs ordesires. For example, a university professor would find value increating custom textbook tailored to a specific course from prepublishedtextbooks stored in a content management system. This compilation couldbe further enhanced to include associated multimedia materials. Asanother example, a music lover would benefit from a system that allowshim to specify musical selections to be included in a custom album. Suchsystems would have to partition large content objects (e.g., albums,books, videos) into smaller, selectable objects (e.g., musicalselection, chapter section, episode) for inclusion in a compilation.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

A web-based system, method and program product are provided for creatinga compilation of content stored in a data repository as a group ofhierarchically related content entities, managing, displaying, andsearching the content, then creating and exporting compilations ofcontent for publication. Also provided are a system, data structure,method, and program product for storing content into a repository foruse in creating a compilation of content.

The content is hierarchical in nature. Accordingly, entities at eachlevel of the hierarchy except the lowest are defined by “containers”.For example, in the case of textual content, the hierarchical structureof the data may include book containers, volume containers, chaptercontainers, and subsections (noncontainers, because they are at the leaflevel of the hierarchy). In the case of audio content, the hierarchicalcontainers may be album, compact disk, and musical selection, andexcerpts of the musical selections are defined as noncontainers. In thecase of video content, the hierarchical containers may include moviesand excerpts from each movie, and frames are defined as noncontainers.If desired, the maximum size of a container may specified. For example,the volume size in a custom book is preferably determined using athreshold value defining maximum amount of content allowable for thatcontainer, and a procedure is provided for managing content entities andcontainers to maintain this maximum.

The hierarchical data and associated metadata are preferably stored in adigital library that includes search support. A web-based user interfaceis provided for presenting a user with a plurality of selectableobjects, each object representing a subset of the hierarchical data(e.g., chapter subsections, musical excerpts, video excerpts, etc.). Theplurality of objects may represent all subsets of the stored content orless than all of the subsets (e.g., categorizing the content and byproviding a bookshelf for each category that a user may browse. The userthen selects one or more of the objects for inclusion in a compilation(e.g., a custom textbook). Alternatively, the user may search thecontent by specifying search criteria through the interface.Additionally, the user may create new content, e.g., a new chapter orsection, for inclusion in the final compilation by inputtinguser-provided material through the web interface. The system preferablystores the new content and creates a reusable, selectable objectassociated with the new content.

Each noncontainer content object is preferably stored as a separateentity in the data repository. Each content entity is also stored as arow in a digital library index class as a collection of attributes andreferences to related content entities. Each containter and noncontaineris associated with a unique identifier that preferably includeshierarchical information about its position in the hierarchy.

As the user selects desired objects for inclusion in a compilation, thesystem arranges the objects hierarchically, e.g., into volumes, chaptersand sections according to the order specified by the user. The systemthen creates a file object (e.g., a CBO) defining the compilation thatcontains a list or outline of the content entities selected, theiridentifiers, order and structure. This file object is stored separatelyin the data repository.

The list or outline is presented to the user at the web interface as atable of contents, and may be edited through the interface. For example,the user may add content, delete content, or move content within andacross containers. Editing the list or outline redefines the structureof the compilation. Once the user is satisfied with the organization ofthe compilation, it is submitted it for publication. The submittedcompilation is then forwarded to an approval process and is accepted,rejected, or returned to the user with editorial comments appended bythe editor.

An aspect of the invention is the calculation of the compilation's costby estimating the amount of content it contains and determining acontent cost based upon the content estimate. Optionally, a cost isassigned to each content entity in the data repository and these actualcosts are summed as part of the cost estimation procedure.

Another aspect of the invention is to provide permission checking.Occasionally, it may be desired to prevent certain content entities fromappearing a same compilation as other content entities. For example, anauthor may specify that his work can not be published in the samecompilation as the work of another author. Permission checking firstrequires associating each container and noncontainer with any mutuallyexclusive containers or noncontainers. For example, such association maybe achieved by defining a set of rules specifying containers and/orcontent entities that are mutually exclusive. Upon selection of acontainer or noncontainer to add to the compilation, the permissionchecking procedure determines if the container or noncontainer ismutually exclusive of any other containers or content objects, e.g., byconsulting the rules. If so, the permission checking procedure thenanalyzes the compilation outline to determine whether any of the othermutually exclusive containers or noncontainers already exists in thecompilation. If so, then the selected container or noncontianer is notadded to the compilation and the user is notified that the contentselected may not be included in the compilation. Otherwise, the contentis added.

A further aspect of the invention is to provide prerequisite checking,wherein some entities are associated, e.g., by a set of rules, withcontent objects that are prerequisites to that object (e.g., front orbackmatter associated with the subsection such as an introduction,appendix, or bibliography), and wherein selection by the user of anentity prerequisites causes automatic inclusion of all associatedprerequisite objects in the final compilation.

Another aspect of the invention is the provision of a functional layerbetween the user interface and data repository for facilitating thecreation, manipulation, storage and management of content objects in thedata repository.

Another aspect of the invention allows a user to create multiplecompilations concurrently. Yet another aspect of the invention allows auser to modify a compilation by creating a clone or copy of thecompilation and applying user-specified changes to the copy (e.g., inthe creation of a new edition or version of an existing work.)

Other aspects of the invention include a configurable model for storinghierarchically related data in a relational database, and a datastructure for storing the data and associated metadata, whereby thehierarchical relationship of the data is preserved.

As a further aspect of the invention, queries are executed on thehierarchical containers and noncontainers through an application oruser-interface. The results of the independent searches are merged usinghit masks. A hit mask is a string of bits, each bit representing aquery. For each container and noncontainer in the result set, a hit maskis generated and ones of the bits are set to indicate which of thequeries the container or noncontainer satisfies. Container hit masks areOR-ed with their child containers and/or noncontainers to reflectinheritance. Containers and noncontainers with all bits set comprise themerged result set.

DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING

FIG. 1 is a block diagram representing the content management systemaccording to the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a block diagram representing the content input path of thepresent invention;

FIG. 3 is a block diagram representing a digital library suitable forpracticing the present invention;

FIG. 4 graphically represents the structures for storing content partsin a digital library;

FIG. 5 graphically represents the index classes used in storing contentin a digital library;

FIG. 6 is a block diagram representing the path for creating andsubmitting compilations of content according to the present invention;

FIG. 7 represents parts of a compilation of content stored in thedigital library;

FIGS. 8A-21B represent the interface of an embodiment of the presentinvention;

FIGS. 22A-22E represent the system administrator interface of anembodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 23 is a block diagram representing the path for approving andpublishing compilations of content; and

FIG. 24 is a state diagram representing the states of a user, requestand CBO at various stages of the process for creating compilations ofcontent.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION I. System Overview

FIG. 1 functionally depicts a system for creating compilations ofcontent. It comprises three parts: a path for inputting content to thedata repository (FIG. 2), a path for enabling a user to select contentand organization from the data repository through a web-based interfacefor inclusion in a compilation of content (FIG. 3), and a path thatinterfaces with a publishing system for creating the compilation ofcontent from the user's specification (FIG. 2). Each path will bedescribed in detail below.

The present invention will now be described in terms of a specificembodiment for creating custom textbooks. The intended user groupcomprises university professors, for example. The content stored in thesystem comprises a plurality of published textbooks, broken down intohierarchically related objects: book, volume, chapter and chaptersubsection.

Using the proposed system in this context, a university professor isable to access content from a collection of textbooks stored in adigital library and select books, volumes, chapters and/or chaptersubsections for inclusion in a custom textbook, and is further able tocreate content objects for inclusion in the final work.

Although the specific embodiment is provided to facilitate the reader'sunderstanding, it will be understood that present invention is of a muchbroader scope and may be applied in the creation of compilations of alltypes of content including text, image, audio and video content.

A. Receiving and Storing Content

In the exemplary embodiment of the invention, content and otherinformation is input to digital library 20 through the input data pathshown in FIG. 2. Briefly, the content and other information is input bya user in at an input interface represented by block 8. In the preferredembodiment, the input content is provided in SGML format, although otherformats may be supported if desired. The content is forwarded by inputapplication 8 to a converter 10 for conversion into the format expectedby data loader 14.

After reformatting, converter 10 outputs the reformatted content andother information to a loader application 14. Loader 14 receives andmaps the data for storage in the data repository according to aconfiguration model 12. According to the present example, the datarepository is a digital library 20, and the configuration model 12 isspecific to the IBM DB2(R) Digital Library data storage model. Loader 14interfaces with the digital library 20 through the digital libraryclient application 16. Using the configuration model 12, the contentloader 14 is able to map the content and other information it receivesin a manner appropriate for the structure of the underlying digitallibrary 20. However, the loader 14 of the present invention may bereconfigured for other types of data repositories by defining aconfiguration model 12 for each data repository used. Thus if the datarepository type is later changed, the configuration file 12 can beupdated to reconfigure the input path without having to reprogram theloader application 14.

The elements of the input path will now be described in greater detail.

1. Digital Library Examples of digital libraries suitable for use in thepresent invention are described in commonly owned U.S. Pat. No.5,787,413 entitled “C++ classes for a digital library” issued toKauffman et al., and U.S. Pat. No. 5,857,203 entitled “Method andapparatus for dividing, mapping and storing large digital objects in aclient/server library system” also issued to Kauffman et al.

In the preferred embodiment of the present invention, the datarepository comprises the commercially available IBM DB2 Digital Library.However, other commercially available data repositories may be usedeither in combination with, or in lieu of, the DB2 Digital Library

Digital libraries are used to store and manage a wide variety of digitalobjects such as documents, graphics, audio, video, spread sheets andword-processing text. A conceptual view of a conventional digitallibrary client/server system is shown in FIG. 3 and includes a libraryserver 44, one or more object servers 48 and a library client 42. Eachof the library and object servers and the library client includes aninformation store. That is, the library server 44 includes a librarycatalog 46, the is object server 48 includes an object store 50 and thelibrary client 42 includes a client cache 40. The client applicationsinterface to the digital library through an object-oriented API 16.Also, a communications isolator (not shown) is included which allows thelibrary server 44, object server 48 and library client 42 to communicatewith one another without concern for complex communications protocols.

The library server, object servers and library clients are connected bya communications network, such as a wide-area network (WAN), but alsocan be locally connected via a local area network (LAN). In theconventional library client/server system the library client 42 istypically embodied in a workstation, such as a personal computer, andthe library server 44 and object servers 48 are typically embodied in ahost processor: generally a mainframe computer environment such as aMVS/ESA environment running under CICS. The library server 44 uses arelational database such as the IBM DB2 Universal Database or the Oracledatabase as a library catalog 46 to manage digital objects and providedata integrity by maintaining index information and controlling accessto objects stored on one or more object servers. Object servers can alsouse a relational database such as IBM DB2 or the Oracle database tomanage their contents. Library servers and object servers run, forexample, on AIX and Windows NT.

Library Server. The library server 44 directs requests from clients toupdate or query entries in the library catalog 46, which contains objectindexes and descriptive information. Library server 44 additionallyperforms searches and routes requests to the appropriate object server48 to store, retrieve, and update objects.

Each user is assigned a set of privileges for access to the library by asystem administrator. Library server 44 checks library catalog 46 beforeprocessing a request to ensure that the user's name and password arevalid, and to ensure that the user has been granted the appropriateprivileges to perform the requested action. An example of a libraryprivilege is the ability to delete objects. In typical implementations,there are groups of individuals who need access to the same objects.Therefore, to simplify the process of granting access to objects asystem administrator can define patrons as members of a group. When apatron is defined as a member of a group, that patron is able to accessany object for which the group has been granted privileges.

The library server 44 also checks to ensure that the object's owner hasgranted the patron the privileges needed to do what is requested (e.g.,update the object). The owner of an object is the user who first storedthe object. When an owner stores an object that owner must specify whichother patrons are to have access to the object.

If a client request involves the storage, retrieval, or update of anobject, library server 44 forwards the request to the object server 48that contains or will store the object(s) referred to in the requestbased upon information provided by library catalog 46. If the clientrequest is a query of the information stored in library catalog 46,library server 44 will interact only with the library catalog 46 andwill not contact object server 20.

Library Catalog. The library catalog 46 is analogous to a conventionallibrary's card catalog. It is a set of database virtual tables or indexclasses which contain an index of all the objects stored in the librarysystem and the object servers owning them. Each row of these virtualtables or index classes references one or more stored objects.Implicitly, the first column of each index class contains a uniquedigital library item identifier (e.g., the IBM DB2 Digital LibraryItemID) for the object referenced by its corresponding row. Otherinformation stored in an index class may include textual descriptionsfor each object, information on the type of object (e.g., image object,spreadsheet, text document), user names and privileges, accessauthorization data for each object, links between objects, and anobject's properties.

An item is a row in an index class and a part is a file within theobject server 48 that is stored in an access managed directorystructure. The management access of the directory structure is performedby the object server 48, but the directory structure responsibilitiesare performed by the operating system (i.e. AIX, NT, MVS).

The library server 44 contains a parts table 62, as shown in FIG. 4,which resides in the library catalog 46. For each part or object in thelibrary system, library server 44 stores information about that part. Asshown in the parts table 62 in FIG. 4, the information stored for a partincludes the item identifier (ItemID), a part number (PartID), arepresentation type (REP type) and an object server ID identifying whichobject server contains the object. In the presently described embodimentof the invention, the REP type is a default value (FRN$NULL).

When a part is stored in the conventional client/server library system20, library server 44 assigns an item ID and a part number, which are 16bytes and 4 bytes long, respectively. The item ID is a unique identifierfor an item (i.e. row in the library server index class) to which thepart belongs. For example, an item could represent a folder in which thepart represents a document within that folder. Likewise, the part numberis a unique identifier for that part.

The REP type field can be used to indicate the type or class in whichthe part is classified. For example, if the part is an image stored in aTIFF format, the REP type for that part could indicate that the part isa TIFF formatted image.

Object Servers. An object server 48 maintains objects stored within thelibrary system. Objects are stored or retrieved from an object store 50by object server 48. Object server 48 receives requests from libraryserver 44 and communicates with library client 42 to complete therequests. Such a library system can contain several distributed objectservers. Referring to FIGS. 3 and 4, the object server field in thelibrary server's parts table 62 indicates the identifier for the objectserver 48 which owns the part. For example, if the part is stored onobject store 50 of object server 48, the object server ID field willcontain the identifier for object server 48.

Each object server 48 contains an object server table 64 as shown inFIG. 4. The object server 48 uses object server table 64 to managestorage of parts in its storage areas, such as the object store 50.Object server table 64 also contains the same item ID, part number andREP type for the part as does the library server parts table 62. Theobject server table also contains a file name for the part 66, whichindicates the location in object store 50 of stored part 66.

When a user's privileges are defined a default object server can be setfor that user. When the user stores an object, it will be stored in hisdefault object server. If it is later determined that an object or agroup of objects should be relocated to a different object server, aclient application can cause those objects to be moved from one objectserver to another.

Library Client. The library client 42 is the interface through whichapplication programs can submit requests to the library system. Thesecan include requests to store objects, update/add descriptors toobjects, delete objects and query information in the library catalog.Library requests can be submitted through the library client eitherindividually or in batches.

The library client 42 includes a client cache 40 used to locally holdcopies of objects that have been stored to or retrieved from the objectserver 48. These local copies allow very fast access to objects andprovide a means for communicating between the library client 42 and theservers 44, 48.

Additional Search Support. IBM DB2 Digital Library includes parametricsearch support, and is integrated with text search support from the IBMIntelligent Miner for Text. The library server 44 may be furtherintegrated with other search support 52. For example, image querying maybe provided by IBM's Query by Image Content(QBIC) technology (seecommonly owned U.S. Pat. No. 5,579,471 to Barber et al.).

In the present example for creating compilations of text, library server44 is preferably coupled to the IBM Intelligent Miner for Text full textsearch support, allowing the user to automatically index, search, andretrieve documents based on a full text search. Text Miner allows usersto locate documents by searching for words or phrases, abbreviations andacronyms, and proper names. In a typical LAN environment, a text searchinstallation comprises one or more servers and several clients. The textsearch server program is installed on a machine with other DigitalLibrary components. The text search client resides on clientworkstations and provides access to the server. Text search runs, forexample, on AIX and Windows 95 and NT. In addition to the server andclient components, text search uses dictionaries to support thelinguistic processing of documents in different languages duringindexing and retrieval. Dictionaries are installed on the serverworkstation, and at each client workstation.

Data Flow. Referring to FIGS. 3 and 4, when a requesting library client42 requests an object, or blob, it sends a request to library server 44.Upon receipt of the request library server 44 consults the parts table62, among other tables, in the library catalog 46 and determines whichobject server 48 owns and has the requested object stored in its objectstore 50. The request contains the item ID, part number and REP type ofthe requested part. Upon receiving the request, object server 48retrieves the blob from object store 50 by consulting its object servertable 64 and sends a copy of it to client 42. Object server 48 storesthe blob in client cache 40. When the blob is successfully transmittedto client cache 40 object server 48 sends a response to library server44 indicating a successful transfer of the blob to client cache 40.Library server 44, in turn, sends a response to requesting libraryclient 42 indicating that the blob was successfully transferred, whichallows the client 42 to retrieve the blob from client cache 40 for useby a client application.

When an application program submits a request for storage of an objectin the library system, library client 42 creates a copy of the object inits client cache 40 to allow the appropriate object server 48 toretrieve the object. The library client then sends a storage request tolibrary server 44. Included in the storage request is a handle to theobject stored in the client cache 40. The handle is an identifier whichis used to locate the object in the client cache.

Upon receiving the storage request, library server 44 updates tables inlibrary catalog 46, including the parts table 62 shown in FIG. 4, toidentify the object server 48 in which the object is to be stored.Typically, the object server 48 is selected by default based on theuser's identity. Library server 44 then sends a request to object server48 to retrieve the blob from the client cache 40 and store it in theobject store 50. Included in the request is the handle of the objectstored in client cache 40 and the item ID, part number and REP type ofthe part.

The object server 48, upon receiving the request to retrieve a copy ofthe object, retrieves the copy from client cache 40 and stores it inobject store 50, then updates its object server table 64 accordingly toindicate a file name for the blob stored in object store 50. The filename uniquely identifies the location of the blob stored in object store50.

Upon successfully storing a copy of the blob, object server 48 sends aresponse to library server 44 to notify it that the object wassuccessfully stored. Library server 44 then updates its tables includingthe parts table 62 to indicate that the object is successfully stored inobject server 48. The library server 44 sends a response to libraryclient 42 indicating that the object was successfully stored so that thelibrary client 42 can take further action based on the fact that theobject was successfully stored in object store 50, such as deallocatingmemory resources for that object in client cache 32.

2. Data Model Definition

Storing content for use in creating a compilation of content firstrequires defining a Data Model, i.e., the constructs for mapping inputcontent and other information in digital library 20. The data model isdependent on the constructs available within the underlying datarepository. It is also defined by the nature of the content andinformation being input.

The content to be stored comprises products such as books, albums,images and videos. The content of each of these products may beorganized hierarchically. For example, the hierarchy of a book may bedefined by its volumes, chapters and chapter subsections. Since it isdesired to create compilations of content from selected entities ofthese products, the content of the input products is partitioned intoselectable entities. Information about the hierarchical relationship isalso stored in the data repository. In the present example, otherinformation to be stored includes user and content category definitions.

In the present example, the data repository is a digital library thatincludes a relational database, and the data model consists of entitygroups defining the constructs in which the content is to be organizedand stored within the relational database. Each entity group includesindex class definitions, and may include part definitions. The partsstore the actual content, and outlines describing the hierarchicalrelationship of the content entities. The index classes definerelational tables for storing parametric attributes parametric (i.e.Integer, Float, Date, Time, String, Char, etc.) of the content,programs, and approval requests. The content index classes furtherinclude references to the parts containing them.

There are four entity groups in the present example: the Product EntityGroup, the Program Entity Group, the CBO Entity Group and the RequestEntity Group. The Product Entity Group defines the constructs forstoring prepublished works or “products” in the digital library 20.These products provide the content from which a user can build acompilation of content. The Program Entity Group defines categories forcontent. In the present example these categories consist of academicprograms. For example, “Freshman Engineering” is one program defined inthe present example. The CBO Entity Group defines the constructs forstoring a compilation of content. The Request Entity Group defines thecontructs for storing information about requests for approval ofcompilations of content.

The following tables represent index class definitions, i.e., the metadefinitions of the index classes. The rows within the figures define thecolumns of the index classes. For example, the Product_Aux index classcontains 8 columns: SeqID, ProductItem, ParentItem, SiblingItem,ChildItem, Keyword, Value and NextValueltem.

Each primary index class contains a fixed number of columns. The columnsof the index class definitions for the primary index classes define theprimary index class column name (first column from the left), attributetype (second column), and source of the attribute value for each columnof the index class (third column). In some cases, an attribute value ispassed to digital library 20 by the loader 14 application, and thesecond column of the definition table is used to map the externalattribute names to the internal digital library attribute names. Inother cases, the attributes are program generated, as is indicated bythe value “program generated” in column two. In the index classdefinition tables below, a fourth column has been added to each table todescribe each column. It shall be understood, however, that this columnis only provided to facilitate the reader's understanding and is not apart of the index class definitions.

The primary index class columns are restricted to single valueattributes. Those columns that are multivalued or were not known whenthe system was first created are placed into the auxiliary index class.

The Program Index Class, Product Index Class and Request Index Classeach have an associated auxiliary index class (ProgramAux Index Class,ProductAux Index Class, and RequestAux Index Class). Use of auxiliaryindex classes is generally understood by those skilled in the use ofdigital libraries. Each row within an auxiliary index class defines anadditional (theoretical) column to a ROW in the corresponding primaryindex class (NOT to the entire primary index class). The column istheoretical in the sense that the digital library 20 does not handleauxiliary index class rows as additional columns in the primary indexclass. Rather, the API layer 30 provides the mapping mechanism to enablethis theoretical column notion. Therefore users perceive these auxiliaryindex class rows as additional columns for a row, but in actuality theyare stored as rows within the auxiliary index class. Theoretically, theprimary index class appears as a table containing multiple rows and eachrow contains the columns defined in the primary index class definitionplus those columns defined by rows in the auxiliary index class. Inother words, these auxiliary index class columns (a.k.a. theoreticalcolumns) are bound to a row within the primary index class and not theprimary index class itself.

The manner in which an auxiliary index class defines theoretical columnson rows of a primary index class will now be described with reference tothe Product Entity auxiliary index class. The ProductItem column(represented as a row in the auxiliary index class definition, below)contains the itemid, a unique identifier for each row in the primaryindex class. This column forms the linkage between a row within theauxiliary index class and the corresponding row of the primary indexclass.

The keyword column of the auxiliary index class (not to be confused withthe Keyword column of the auxiliary index class definition) representsthe name of the theoretical column to be added to a row of the primaryindex class. The current domain of theoretical primary index classcolumn names appears in the Keywords column of the product auxiliaryindex class definition, below (2nd column from left). For example, onetheoretical column name is Pub_Med_Type.

Note: In the present example, the domain is not restricted by thedigital library 20 other than that the names must not exceed the lengthof the keyword column definition. Therefore, the domain of theoreticalprimary index class column names can be continuously enlarged by simplyadding additional columns to the auxiliary index class.

The Value column contains the value for the theoretical columnidentified by the auxiliary index class Keyword column.

In addition to defining additional theoretical primary index classcolumns, the auxiliary index class can store multiple valued theoreticalcolumns and hierarchical theoretical columns. Similar to theoreticalsingle valued columns, theoretical multiple valued columns can berepresented within a relational datastore model by using rows of anauxiliary index class. In the single valued column, only one row isnecessary. In the multiple valued column, two or more rows are necessary(1 row for each value needing to be stored). Each value in the multiplevalued column is ordered. This order is then used to chain multiple rowswithin the auxiliary index class together. Furthermore, theNextValueltem column contains the unique identifier of the auxiliaryindex class row which follows in the multivalued chain.

For example, if one wishes to store a multivalued column, First_Namewith values: Fred and Barney and the auxiliary index class rowcontaining Barney in the Value column has a unique identifier equal toABC then the NextValueItem column for the row containing Fred in theValue column is ABC. Thus, the NextValueltem serves as the pointer tothe next value in the multivalued chain.

The ParentItem, SiblingItem and ChildItem columns in the auxiliary indexclass are used to store hierarchical attributes of a row. Since a book'sdata model is hierarchical, the concept of hierarchical attributestorage/retrieval is crucial. The ParentItem column of a row in theauxiliary index class contains the unique identifier or itemid ofanother row in the auxiliary index class that holds a parent attributeof the current row. Similar to the multivalued columns, the children ofa container are ordered (chained together). The unique identifier of theauxiliary index class row containing the proceding child is stored inthe Siblingltem field. A container's first child's unique identifier isstored in the ChildItem column of the container row, therebyconstructing a link between the container and first child, first childand second child and all other children after.

For example, the AC_Group column in the product auxiliary index class isa hierarchical attribute. AC_Group contains child attributes: ACFORMIDand NUMBERAC. This inheritance is identifiable by the tabbing of theterms in the keywords column of the figure. Each AC_Group attributecontains an ACFORMID and NUMBERAC. Therefore the AC_Group is a kind ofcontainer.

This attribute family is represented by three rows within the auxiliaryindex class: one representing an AC_Group, one representing the ACFORMIDand one representing the NUMBERAC. The parentItem column for theAC_Group row is blank to indicate that it is a parent attribute, whereasthe parentItem column for the ACFORMID and NUMBERAC rows contains theunique identifier of the AC_Group row. The ChildItem column of theAC_Group contains the unique identifier of the ACFORMID row. TheSiblingItem column for the ACFORMID contains the unique identifier ofthe NUMBERAC row. The NUMBERAC row's SiblingItem is left blankrepresenting the last child of AC_Group.

The Product and CBO Entity Groups are associated with Part definitions,since these entities define constructs for storing content in thedigital library 20.

Product Entity Group

The Product Entity Group includes two index classes: Product Index Classand ProductAux (Auxiliary) Index Class. These index classes define thestorage model for existing content products and their associatedattributes to be stored. More specifically, they are used to generate aProduct Index class in a relational database representing the contentproducts, and the parts containing the actual content, prerequisitematerial and hierarchical product outline.

“Product” in this context refers to an existing content product such asa book, album or video. Since users will be selecting excerpts ofexisting content products to include in a compilation of content, eachcontent product is stored as a group of hierarchically related entitiesEntities at each hierarchical level of the work except the lowest isdefined by containers. In the present example, the containers are“book”, “volume”, and “chapter”. Each container is described by thesubentities or “content entities” it contains. For example, each“book.c” container includes references to all chapters denoted by thekeyword, “chapter.c”, contained in that textbook product. Similarly,each “chapter.c” container includes references to all sections containedin that chapter. The lowest level of the hierarchy is a “section”. Allthree entities (book.c, chapter.c and section) are described by a uniquesequence identifier. Each entity is represented by a row in the ProductIndex class.

Product Index Class

The product index class defines a relational Product Index Class that ispopulated with a row for each content entity. Thus for textbook productsthe resulting product index class includes a row for each book, volume,chapter and section. In addition, each associated component for anentity is also represented by a row in the index class This index classis used as a quick reference for obtaining attribute information abouteach product entity, as well as a reference to the actual part numberscontaining the product files.

Each product entity is assigned a unique identifier or sequence ID.Preferably, the sequence identifier further includes intrinsicinformation about the hierarchical level of the entity. To illustrate,the sequence ID used to represent textbook components is in thefollowing form:

-   -   XXXXXXXXXX.CC.SS        where XXXXXXXXXX represents a book's ISBN (International        Standard Book Number?), CC represents the chapter number (if        any) and SS represents the section number (if any). The CC and        SS portions of a book entity sequence identifier will be zeroes.        Similarly, the SS portion of a chapter entity sequence        identifier will be zero. Thus the sequence number of a container        serves as a reference to the subentities of that container,        since all subentities will share the same ISBN and container        reference number. For leaf entities, the sequence number is used        as a reference to the entity's actual content in the data        repository.

Index Class Attribute Name ATR Mapping Type Description SeqID Seq_IDExt..Alpha [32] Unique sequence identifier for product entity INDEXEDEntityType PSF Ext..Alpha [32] Entity type, e.g., book, chapter, sectionParentItem Program generated Ext..Alpha [16] Unique internal ID of anyparent entity (e.g. For a section entity, the parent would be itschapter container) SiblingItem Program generated Ext..Alpha [16] Uniqueinternal ID of the next sibling entity (e.g. For a section entity, thesiblings would be other sections of the same chapter. ChildItem Programgenerated Ext..Alpha [16] Unique internal ID of the first child entity(e.g. a chapter entity's children would he the sections it contains.AuxItem Program generated Ext..Alpha [16] Reference to first entry inthe auxiliary table for this entity ProgramID PE_ID Alpha [4] Identifierof Program to which the product AC_PE_ID belongs Status Status (SGML)Alpha [1] Indicates if entity is available for browse, AC_Status (AC)search or use in a CBO Title Title Alpha [250] Entity title AC_TitleSubtitle Subtitle Alpha [250] Entity subtitle, if any AC_Subtitle ISBNISBN Alpha [10] Product ISBN AC_ISBN CDAOID CDAOID Ext. Alpha [8]Associated component attribute AC_CDAOID YearOfPub Yr_of_Pub Numeric[1] * AC_Yr_of_Pub Edition Edition Ext. Alpha [2] * AC_Edition RevisionRevision Alpha [2] * AC_Revision Version Content_Ver Ext. Alpha [8] *AC_Content_Ver PubMediaType Ext. Alpha [20] Media type, e.g., compactdisk ContentType Content_Type Ext. Alpha [8] Content type, e.g., SGMLAC_Content_Type ContentFilename Filename Ext. Alpha [254] Name of filecontaining the entity's content AC_Graphic_Filename ImageTypeAC_Image_Type Ext. Alpha [8] Type of image, e.g., TIF. CharCountSGML_Char_Cnt Numeric [8] Number of non-markup characters in content(used to calculate CBO price) AC_ImageCount AC_Image_Cnt Numeric [3]Number of associated component images in content AvailabilityDateDate_of_Availability Ext. Alpha [10] Date entity is available for useAC_Date_of_Availability ExpirationDate Date_of_Expiration Ext. Alpha[10] Date entity is no longer available for use AC_Date_of_ExpirationCreateDate Create_Date Ext. Alpha [14] Date that table entry was createdAC_Create_Date CreatedBy Created_By Alpha [8] Identifier of user whocreated entry AC_CreatedBy LastModifiedDate Last_Modified_Date Ext.Alpha [14] Last date entry was modified AC_Last_Modified_(—) DateLastModifiedBy Last_Modified_By Alpha [8] Identifier of user who lastmodified entry AC_LastModifiedBy PageCount Pagecount Alpha [6] Actualpage count of content (used in CBO pricing formula)Part Structures & Text Indices

This table defines the digital library parts used to store each entity.For a row that represents a product entity, Part 1 contains the SGMLcontent for a product entity. Parts 5-11 are parts containing subsets ofthat content that can be searched by Text Miner. The Text Index columncontains the Text Miner indices for each of these searchable subsets.For a row that represents an entity's associated component, Part 20contains the actual associated component file. (e.g., images).

Part No. Description Test Index 1 Content None 5 Authored AbstractEABSTRAC 6 Generated Abstract EABSTRAC 7 Index Terms EIXTERMS 8 KeyTerms EIXTERMS 9 Entity Structure Part None 10 Teaching ConceptsETEACHCO 11 Concepts Topics ETOPICS 20 Associated Component NoneProductAux Index Class

In the present example, the auxiliary index class is used to defineadditional columns in specified rows of the Product Index classSpecifically, each label in the Keywords column corresponding to theKeyword attribute defines the name of an additional column in theProduct Index class The “value” attribute is the attribute type for eachof these keywords. Indentations represent nested keywords. The SeqID,ProductItem, ParentItem, SiblingItem and ChildItem attributes specifythe rows in the auxiliary Product Index class for storing hierarchicalvalues. In the present example, “Index_Term” is an example of amulti-valued attribute, meaning that there may be more than one indexterm defined for each program entity. For performance reasons, thevalues of a multivalued attribute may be stored in separate rows of theProduct Index class Thus The “Next ValueItem” attribute identifies therow of the next item in a set of attribute values. Multivaluedattributes are structured as linked lists when loaded into digitallibrary 20, and this order is maintained in the auxiliary Product Indexclass.

Index Class Attribute Name Keywords Type Description SeqID PSF Ext.Alpha [32] Sequence ID of entity that this attribute belongs toProductItem Program generated Ext. Alpha [16] Unique internal ID of theproduct index class row that this attribute belongs to ParentItemProgram generated Ext. Alpha [16] Unique internal ID of the auxiliaryproduct index class row that is this attribute's parent attributeSiblingItem Program generated Ext. Alpha [16] Unique internal ID of theauxiliary product index class row that is this attribute's next siblingattribute ChildItem Program generated Ext. Alpha [16] Unique internal IDof the auxiliary product index class row that is the first childattribute for this attribute Keyword Pub_Med_Type Alpha [32] Media type(e.g., compact disk, audio tape, paper, etc.) AC_Counts AC (AssociatedComponent) attribute group ACFORMID AC type. NUMBERAC The number foreach AC type. Index_Term Index term in a product entity Key_Term Keyterm in a product entity Contrib_Group This group defines properties re:one Contrib_Role contributing author of a prepublished Contrib_Titlebook. Since a book can have multiple Contrib_First_Name contributors,more than one Contrib_Middle_Name contrib_group of properties can existContrib_Last_Name for that book. Contrib_Suffix Job_TitleContrib_Affiliation Contrib_Credentials Use_Actuals Switch variable todetermine if actual or estimated page count is to be used in calculatingprice. Value Value depends on specific Ext. Alpha Actual value for thekeyword above attribute keyword above [254] NextValueItem Programgenerated Ext. Alpha [16] Unique ID of the auxiliary product index classrow that is the next value in a multi-valued attribute.Program Entity Group

It is sometimes desirable to categorize users and content to facilitatethe creation of a compilation. For example, a system user who wishes tocompile an album of classical music is not interested in viewingselections from a country music album. Audio content may therefore becategorized according to music type. The user may also be assigned to aparticular category, either by default or by personal selection. In asystem for creating custom textbooks, subsets are organized according toparticular programs or disciplines. For example, prepublished textbooksmay be assigned to categories such as Engineering, Mathematics, English,and so on. In the present example, these categories have been definedeven more narrowly Freshman Engineering, Sophomore Engineering, etc.

A Program Entity Group is used to define categories or “programs” towhich users and prepublished content can be assigned.

Program Index Class

The Program Index Class definition below defines a Program Index Classor Program Index class that is populated with a row for eachuser/content category. This index class is used as a quick reference forobtaining attribute information about each program.

Index Class Attribute Name ATR Mapping Type Description Program_IDPE_Program_ID Alpha [4] Program identifier, e.g. “FE” is the INDEXEDidentifier for “Freshman Engineering” EntityType PSF Ext. Alpha Usedwhen programs are nested to define [32] hierarchical level of eachprogram entity ParentItem Program generated Ext..Alpha Supportinghierarchical or “parent” [16] programs Title PE_Title Alpha [250]Program Title Subtitle PE_Subtitle Alpha [250] Program subtitle, if anyAvgChrPerImage PE_AC_Avg_Image_Bytes Numeric [6] Average characters perimage for products within this program AvgChrPerSGMLACPE_AC_Avg_SGML_Bytes Numeric [6] Average characters per SGML associatedcomponent for products within this program MaxChrPerUPMTierPE_Chars_Per_UPM_Tier Numeric [6] Maximum number of characters allowedfor a UPM in this program Status PE_Status Alpha [1] Status indicatingwhether program entity is currently valid/invalid CreateDatePE_CreateDate Ext..Alpha Date table entry created [14] CreateByPE_CreateBy Alpha [8] Identifier of user who created entryLastModifiedDate PE_LastModifiedDate Ext..Alpha Date entry was lastmodified [14] LastModifiedBy PE_LastModifiedBy Alpha [8] Identifier ofuser who last modified entry SiblingItem Program generated Ext..AlphaRelated sibling programs providing [16] support for hierarchicalprograms. ChildItem Program generated Ext..Alpha Related child programs,if any, providing [16] support for hierarchical programs. AuxItemProgram generated Ext..Alpha Reference to auxiliary table [16] SeqID PSFExt. Alpha Unique program identifier, e.g., “FE” for [32] “FreshmanEngineering”

ProgramAux Index Class Index Class Attribute Name Keywords TypeDescription SeqID PSF Ext. Alpha Unique identifier (i.e., Sequence ID)[32] of this row. ProgramItem Program generated Ext..Alpha Uniqueinternal ID of row within [16] auxiliary program index class that thisattribute belongs to ParentItem Program generated Ext..Alpha Uniqueinternal ID of row within [16] auxiliary program index class that thisattribute's parent attribute belongs to SiblingItem Program generatedEx..Alpha Unique internal ID of row within [16] auxiliary program indexthat this attribute's next sibling attribute belongs to ChildItemProgram generated Ext..Alpha Unique internal ID of row within [16]auxiliary program index that the first child attribute for thisattribute belongs to Keyword PE_Req_Count Alpha [32] The next availableunique identifier for a request PE_AC_Group This group definesassociated component attributes used in the pricing formula PE_AC_FormIDAC type PE_AC_ByteCount Number of “characters” for that AC typePE_Price_Group This group defines more attributes used in pricingformula PE_Country Country PE_Monetary_Unit Monetary unitPE_Min_Order_Price Minimum order price PE_Base_Cust_Pub_Price Base priceadded to every custom publication PE_Base_UPM_Fee Base price added whenUPM is included PE_Incr_UPM_Fee Additional price per UPM pricing blockPE_Source_Price_Per_Page Price per page for prepublished contentincluded PE_UPM_Bytes_Per_Page Number of UPM characters in a pagePE_Minimum_Page_Limit Minimum number of pages required in a custompublication PE_Volume_Page_Limit Maximum number of pages in a volumeValue Value depends on specific attribute Ext. Alph keyword above [254]NextValueItem Program Generated Ext..Alpha Unique internal ID of rowwithin [16] auxiliary program index representing the next value of amulti-valued attribute.CustomBookOutline Index Class

The CustomBookOutline Index Class defines a relational CBO Index Classthat includes a row for each compilation of content created. Each rowfurther includes a reference to a part containing a road map or outlineof the compilation of content. The index class is used as a quickreference for obtaining attribute information about a compilation, aswell as for locating the corresponding part numbers. Again, theattributes are a matter of design choice.

Index Class Attribute Name Source Type Description ProgramID Webapplication Ext. Alpha [4] Program identifier CBOTitle Web applicationAlpha [120] Custom book title ApprovalStatus Program generated Alpha [1]Approval status, i.e., active, submitted, approved, rejected or printedUPMCharCount Program generated Alpha [8] Character count of anyuser-provided content RightsFee Program generated Alpha [8] License feeSGMLPageEstimate Program generated Alpha [4] Estimated page count forSGML content TotalPageEstimate Program generated Alpha [4] Estimagedtotal page count PriceEstimate Program generated Alpha [8] Estimatedprice ISBN Program generated Alpha [10] Unique ISBN assigned to thecustom book at submission time. CreatorID Program generated Alpha [20]Creator's unique identifier CreatorTS Program generated Alpha [14]Timestamp representing time of current edit LastModifiedTS Programgenerated Alpha [14] Timestamp representing time last modified CBOTermsProgram generated Ext. Alpha [32] Name of file containing terms andconditions that will apply to custom book? ActiveCBOPartID Programgenerated Alpha [3] Part number of active custom book LastUPMPartIDProgram generated Alpha [3] Part number of the last user-providedmaterial addedPart Structures & Text Indices

The part definition describes the parts associated with eachcompilation. In the present example, three parts are defined: part 1initially containing the custom book outline, part 2 initiallycontaining a backup copy of the custom book outline for use in undooperations, and parts numbered 50 or higher containing user providedmaterial (UPM). (Note: After undo, part 2 becomes the active CBO, andpart 1 is the backup. The attribute value of “ActiveCBOPartID” indicateswhich is of these is currently the active part.) The first UPM added toa custom book is assigned to part 50, the second UPM added is assignedpart 51, and so on. The last UPM part number assigned is stored in theCBO Index class defined above and serves two functions. It is a valuethat is retrieved and incremented each time new UPM is added. Inaddition, it serves as an indicator of how many parts the custom bookcurrently contains.

Part No. Description Text Index 1 Part number for Active/ None InactiveCBO 2 Part number for Active/ None Inactive CBO 50+ Part numbers forNone user-provided contentRequest Entity Group

Whenever a compilation of content is submitted for publication, theRequest Entity Group is used to generate an entry in a Request indexclass corresponding to the submission request. A unique ISBN is assignedto the CBO once it has been approved for publishing. Attributes are amatter of design choice. In the present example, they describe usefulinformation about the custom book such as its unique identifier, author,approval status, price, etc.

Request Index Class

Index Class Attribute Source Type Description CBOID Program generatedExt. Alpha [20] Unique CBO identifier assigned at submission time UseridProgram generated Ext. Alpha [20] Author ApprovalStatus Programgenerated Alpha [1] CBO state in the process 0 - Active 1 - Submitted2 - Approved 3 - Rejected 4 - Printed TotalPrice Program generatedNumeric [9] Price of custom book QtyStudentCopies Web applicationNumeric [4] Number of student copies requested QtyDeskCopies Webapplication Numeric [2] Number of desk copies requested QtySupplementsWeb application Numeric [2] Number of books to be used as supplementsNeedByDate Web application Ext. Alpha [10] Date needed by TermStartDateWeb application Ext. Alpha [10] Start date of the school term for whichthis CBO is created TermName Web application Ext. Alpha [20] E.g.,Spring, Fall University Web application Ext. Alpha [100] Universityname, e.g., Stanford University Department Web application Ext. Alpha[100] Department name, e.g., Electrical Engineering ClassName Webapplication Ext. Alpha [128] Class name, e.g., Engineering BasicsClassNumber Web application Ext. Alpha [12] Class number CourseNumberWeb application Ext. Aipha [12] Course number, e.g., 101 ShipToNameTitleWeb application Ext. Alpha [12] * ShipToFirstName Web application Ext.Alpha [40] * ShipToLastName Web application Ext. Alpha [40] *ShipToAddrLine1 Web application Ext. Alpha [40] * ShipToAddrLine2 Webapplication Ext. Alpha [40] * ShipToAddrLine3 Web application Ext. Alpha[40] * ShipToCity Web application Ext. Alpha [40] * ShipToState Webappiication Ext. Alpha [20] * ShipToCountry Web application Ext. Alpha[20] * ShipToPostalCode Web application Ext. Alpha [20] * PackageISBNProgram generated Alpha [10] The ISBN assigned to the entire book. Thismay be different from the ISBN's assigned to volumes within the book.CreateTS Program generated Alpha [14] Time entry created RequestIDProgram generated Ext. Alpha [16] Unique request identifier*Self-explanatoryRequestAux Index Class

The RequestAux Index Class is used in the present example to addadditional columns to designated rows of the Request Index class when aCBO contains more than one volume. More specifically, if greater thanone volume exists, the CBO and each volume it contains are each assigneda unique ISBN, and the Volume, VolumeISBN and VolumeID columns are addedto the row representing the submission request. The RequestItem,ParentItem, SiblingItem and ChildItem attributes are used to identifythe row to which these columns are added.

Index Class Attribute Name Source Type Description RequestItem Programgenerated Ext. Alpha [16] Unique internal ID of row within request indexclass of entity that this attribute belongs to ParentItem Programgenerated Ext. Alpha [16] Unique internal ID of row within auxiliaryrequest index class of entity that is this attribute's parentSiblingItem Program generated Ext. Alpha [16] Unique internal ID of rowwithin auxiliary request index class of entity that is this attribute'snext sibling (siblings are ordered) ChildItem Program generated Ext.Alpha [16] Unique internal ID of row within auxiliary request indexclass of entity that is this attribute's first child (children areordered). Keyword Volume Alpha [32] The parent attribute of the volumeinformation. VolumeISBN The child attribute of Volume which stores theISBN of the volume. VolumeID unique internal ID of row within requestindex class of volume entity corresponding to this volume. Value Programgenerated Ext. Alpha [254] NextValueItem Program generated Ext. Alpha[16] Unique internal ID of row within auxiliary request indexrepresenting the next value of a multi valued attribute.Login/Registration Database Model

The Users Table simply defines a relational table for storing userinformation. The fourth column represents if this is a primary key fieldand the fifth column represents if this is a foreign key field.

USERS Table Table Table Table Table Column Table Column Column NullColumn Column Name Datatype Option Is PK Is FK USER_ID VARCHAR2(30) NOTNULL Yes No DEPT_UD_ID NUMBER(8) NULL No No UNIV_UD_ID NUMBER(8) NULL NoNo DEPARTMENT_ID NUMBER(8) NULL No No UNIV_ID NUMBER(8) NULL No NoUSERNAME VARCHAR2(30) NOT NULL No No PASSWORD VARCHAR2(30) NOT NULL NoNo TITLE VARCHAR2(100) NULL No No FIRST_NAME VARCHAR2(30) NULL No NoLAST_NAME VARCHAR2(30) NULL No No ADDRESS1 VARCHAR2(80) NULL No NoADDRESS2 VARCHAR2(80) NULL No No ADDRESS3 VARCHAR2(80) NULL No No CITYVARCHAR2(50) NULL No No STATE VARCHAR2(2) NULL No No ZIP VARCHAR2(10)NULL No No COUNTRY VARCHAR2(50) NULL No No PHONE VARCHAR2(15) NULL No NoEMAIL VARCHAR2(80) NOT NULL No No CHALLENGE VARCHAR2(255) NOT NULL No NoRESPONSE VARCHAR2(255) NOT NULL No No SECURITY CHAR(1) NOT NULL No NoTIMESTAMP DATE NULL No No CBO_ID VARCHAR2(64) NULL No NoUSER_CBOS TableThe USER_CBOS table enables a user to have more than one active CBO at atime.

Table Table Table Table Column Table Column Column Null Column ColumnName Datatype Option Is PK Is FK USER_ID NUMBER(8) NOT NULL Yes No CBOVARCHAR2(100) NULL No No TIMESTAMP DATE NULL No No

3. Input Interface

An interface 8 is provided to the user for entering information to bestored in digital library 20. Information includes Program categoriesand prepublished content. The interface can be in a variety of forms,but it must be able to communicate with an OO Api layer 30 which is inthe present embodiment comprises a C dll. The interface 8 of the presentembodiment is a web based solution consisting of 22, 24, 26 and 28.Alternatively, application code 28 may provide the same function.

In the present example, each prepublished content product is input asone SGML file. The hierarchical levels within that SGML file arediscernible by their delimiting tag types Program information isprovided as a field identifying the program for each prepublishedcontent product. The program configuration information is defined inPSF/ATR files and loaded into the datastore using the loader 10.

4. Converter

Converter 10 receives the SGML files and uses the delimiting tags toseparate the product entities and associated components. It also buildsa file defining the hierarchical relationships of these entities andcomponents, and extracts relevant product attributes. In the presentexample, the resulting files include four possible file types: a ProductStructure File (PSF), Attribute Files (ATR), Content Component Files andAssociated Component Files.

Product Structure Files (PSF). For content, the Product Structure Fileprovides a hierarchical outline of the contents in a prepublishedproduct. More specifically, it is a parsable formatted file listing allof the entities making up a content product (e.g., a book container,volume containers, chapter containers and sections, each identified byits sequence identifier). This file is used as a road map (i.e., a listor table of contents) defining the content, order and hierarchicalstructure of the prepublished product, thereby relating a product'sseparately stored content entities. It is stored as a part in digitallibrary 20. An example of a PSF file for a content product is shownbelow:

PRODUCT.C:0130808598.00.00.00 FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.01.01.00FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.01.02.00FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.01.03.00FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.01.04.00 CHAPTER.C:0130808598.02.00.00 FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.02.01.00SECTION:0130808598.02.02.00 SECTION:0130808598.02.03.00SECTION:0130808598.02.04.00 SECTION:0130808598.02.05.00SECTION:0130808598.02.06.00 FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.02.07.00CHAPTER.C:0130808598.03.00.00 FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.03.01.00SECTION:0130808598.03.02.00 SECTION:0130808598.03.03.00SECTION:0130808598.03.04.00 SECTION:0130808598.03.05.00SECTION:0130808598.03.06.00 FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.03.07.00CHAPTER.C:0130808598.04.00.00 FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.04.01.00SECTION:0130808598.04.02.00 SECTION:0130808598.04.03.00SECTION:0130808598.04.04.00 SECTION:0130808598.04.05.00FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.04.06.00 CHAPTER.C:0130808598.05.00.00FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.05.01.00 SECTION:0130808598.05.02.00SECTION:0130808598.05.03.00 SECTION:0130808598.05.04.00SECTION:0130808598.05.05.00 SECTION:0130808598.05.06.00FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.05.07.00 CHAPTER.C:0130808598.06.00.00FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.06.01.00 SECTION:0130808598.06.02.00SECTION:0130808598.06.03.00 SECTION:0130808598.06.04.00SECTION:0130808598.06.05.00 SECTION:0130808598.06.06.00SECTION:0130808598.06.07.00 SECTION:0130808598.06.08.00FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.06.09.00 CHAPTER.C:0130808598.07.00.00FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.07.01.00 SECTION:0130808598.07.02.00SECTION:0130808598.07.03.00 SECTION:0130808598.07.04.00SECTION:0130808598.07.05.00 FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.07.06.00CHAPTER.C:0130808598.08.00.00 FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.08.01.00SECTION:0130808598.08.02.00 SECTION:0130808598.08.03.00FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.08.04.00 CHAPTER.C:0130808598.09.00.00FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.09.01.00 SECTION:0130808598.09.02.00FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.09.03.00 CHAPTER.C:0130808598.10.00.00FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.10.01.00 SECTION:0130808598.10.02.00SECTION:0130808598.10.03.00 FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.10.04.00CHAPTER.C:0130808598.11.00.00 FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.11.01.00SECTION:0130808598.11.02.00 SECTION:0130808598.11.03.00FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.11.04.00FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:0130808598.12.01.00For program categories, the PSF file contains the unique programidentifier. As an example, the contents of a PSF file for the “FreshmanEngineering” program is shown below:

-   -   PROGRAM:fe

Attribute Files (ATR). Attribute files contain metadata about eachprogram or product entity input. This information must be extracted byconverter 10. These files are mapped to the program and product indexclass defined by the Program and Product index classes (using theELOADER.INI file described below) and stored in digital library 20.There is one attribute file for each program and for each product entityto be stored. Examples of ATR files are shown below. The first is an ATRfile for a “book”:

;; ;; PRODUCT.C - ATR file - Created: 29 October 1999 21:55:06 ;; ;;Seq_ID: 0130808598.00.00.00 ;; !SKU:0000000014595 !ISBN:0130808598!Title:Engineering Success !Contrib_Group !   Contrib_First_Name:Peter!   Contrib_Last_Name:Schiavone !   Contrib_Affiliation:University ofAlberta !PE_ID:FE !Status:0 !Page_Count:0 !Use_Actuals:1 !Yr_of_Pub:1999!Edition:01 !Revision:00 !Version:01.00 !Created_By:BARKER!LastModified_By:BARKERThe ATR for chapter 3 of the preceding book is shown below:

;; ;; CHAPTER.C - ATR file - Created: 29 October 1999 21:55:09 ;; ;;Seq_ID: 0130808598.03.00.00 ;; !SKU:0000000014618 !Title:Introduction toEngineering and Engineering Study !Authored_Abstract:&Idquo;How much doyou know about engineering?Why did you choose to study engineering?Whatreasons lead you to believe that you are ready and equipped to studyengineering?What are the main differences between studying at auniversity and studying in high school?What new success skills do youneed to succeed in engineering study?Can you write down 10 answers toeach question I have asked you?Go ahead and try.&rdquo;!Authored_Abstract:This is often how I begin my lecture to freshmanengineering students enrolled in an introductory engineering class.After a little thought, most ot them realize just how little they knowabout this subject called engineering and (often despite excellent highschool averages) how ill equipped they are to study engineering.!Authored_Abstract:In this chapter, we address both issues. First, weask the following questions:What is engineering?What do engineers do?Whychoose to study engineering? !Authored_Abstract:The answers to thesequestions are not only interesting and informative, but will help keepyou motivated along the long, hard road to an engineering degree.!Authored_Abstract:In , we address the question, &Idquo;Are you preparedand equipped for engineering study?&rdquo; In doing so, we examine thestudy skills required to succeed in the university environment. For manystudents, the university is the next logical step after high school, thenext academic challenge. Consequently, they expect their freshman yearin engineering to be much like another year of high school-which, ofcourse, it isn&rsquo;t. In engineering, such an exception oftenmanifests itself in unacceptably high first-year attrition rates. Weaddress this issue by focusing on what you need to do to ensure the bestpossible start to earning your engineering degree. Essentially, you mustdevelop the necessary:Work strategiesStudystrategiesAttitudesCommunication skillsAbility to work as part of ateamTime management skillsThe ATR for section 3.2 of the same book is shown below:

;; ;; SECTION - ATR file - Created: 29 October 1999 21:55:09 ;; ;;Seq_ID: 0130808598.03.02.00 ;; !Filename:0130808598.03.02.00.sgm!CDAOID:AABQHDS0 !Index_Term:engineering !Index_Term:defined!Index_Term:engineering, study !Index_Term:introduction to!Index_Term:engineering, defined !Title:What Is Engineering?!SGML_Char_Cnt:2370 !AC_Counts ACFORMID:2 NUMBERAC:1!Associated_Component ! AC_PE_ID:FE ! AC_CDAOID:AABQHDTO ! AC_Title:FIG1! AC_Image_Type:TIFF ! AC_Graphic_Filename:HiRes\AABOHDT0.TIF !AC_Authored_Abstract:NoneThe ATR file for the “Freshman Engineering” program is shown below:

;; ;Program ID for Freshman Engineering set to “FE” !PE_Program_ID:FE!PE_Title:Freshman Engineering !PE_Subtitle: !PE_Req_Count:ESOU002300;!PE_Related_Material:<value> !PE_AC_Group ! PE_AC_FormID:1 !PE_AC_ByteCount:2 ! PE_AC_FormDesc:Inline Graphic !PE_AC_Group !PE_AC_FormID:2 ! PE_AC_ByteCount:1000 ! PE_AC_FormDesc:Display Graphic!PE_AC_Group ! PE_AC_FormID:3 ! PE_AC_ByteCount:68 !PE_AC_FormDesc:Inline Equation !PE_AC_Group ! PE_AC_FormID:4 !PE_AC_ByteCount:180 ! PE_AC_FormDesc:Display Equation !PE_AC_Group !PE_AC_FormID:5 ! PE_AC_ByteCount:2000 ! PE_AC_FormDesc:SGML!PE_AC_Avg_Image_Bytes:0 !PE_AC_Avg_SGML_Bytes:0!PE_Chars_Per_UPM_Tier:2000 !PE_Price_Group ! PE_Country:0 !PE_Monetary_Unit:USD ! PE_Min_Order_Price:1000 !PE_Base_Cust_Pub_Price:1000 ! PE_Base_UPM_Fee:0 ! PE_Incr_UPM_Fee:10;JDR add 1/21/99 ! PE_Source_Price_Per_Page:10 !PE_Minimum_Page_Limit:80 ! PE_Volume_Page_Limit:480 !PE_UPM_Bytes_Per_Page:1000 !PE_Status:F !PE_CreateDate:1998-12-07!PE_CreatedBy:UHANAED !PE_LastModifiedDate:1999-1-19!PE_LastModifiedBy:UHANAED

Content Component Files (SGML). Content component files contain theproduct entities' actual ASCII or binary content that will be stored asparts in digital library 20. In the present example, these filescomprise SGML files containing the ASCII text of chapter sections.

Associated Component Files. Associated Component (AC) Files contain anynon-SGML content associated with the product entities. The content inthe associated component files is stored as parts in digital library 20.

Both prepublished content and custom book outlines (CBO's), describedbelow, are represented in the described file format. A feature of thisformat is that content objects such as a prepublished book or CBO aredefined by the PSF file. Thus the PSF file may be used to redefine thecontent, order and structure of the content object without having toaccess the content itself. This feature proves useful in creatingcompilations of content, by simplifying the process for adding, movingand deleting content.

Composite PSF & ATR Files. Out of the PSF and ATR format comes a thirdfile format that is a composite form of PSF and ATR. For simplicity,this type is also referred to as a PSF+ATR format. One can think of thisfile as a merge of PSF and ATR files, where attributes from an entity'sATR file have been inserted after that entity in the PSF. For example,it may be desirable to include certain attributes with a PSF file (e.g.,author and price). It may be desirable to add certain attributes to theproduct structure file (e.g., author) when it is stored in the digitallibrary. Accordingly, in the present embodiment, what is stored as“Entity Structure Part” described earlier is actually a composite formof PSF and ATR. For a book or product level entity, this file includesall entities in the book (including the book itself) and theirattributes. For a chapter level entity, this file includes all entitiesin the chapter (including the chapter itself) and their attributes. Fora section level entity, this file includes the section entity and itsattributes. Attributes are also added to PSF files containing customcompilation outlines created by system users, and Equery result files.In the Equery results files, all of the entities returned are treatedflat, namely at the same hierarchical level.

An example of a composite file format is shown below:

Top_Entity 1: sequence_ID !Attribute1: value !Attribute2: value!Attribute3: ! Subattribute1: value ! Subattribute2: value !Attribute4:Value4 Sub_Entity1: Sequence_ID !Attribute1: value !Attribute2: valueSub_Sub_Entity1: Sequence_ID !Attribute1: value !Attribute2: valueSub_Entity2: Sequence_ID !Attribute1: value !Attribute2: valueAn exemplaryentity structure part stored in Digital Library is providedin Appendix A.

In the present example, converter 10 is preferably Active System'sAttribute Extractor (i.e. AE). Converter 10 creates a load directory foreach prepublished content product, identified by that product's ISBN,which contains the product's corresponding Product Structure File (PSF),Attribute Files, Content Component Files and Associated Component Files.It also creates a load directory for each program category, identifiedby the program identifier and containing the program's corresponding PSFand ATR files. These directories are provided as input to content loader14.

4. Content Loader

Content loader 14 is a software application for loading the program andprepublished content files described above into the digital library 20.It receives the load directories as input from converter 10, then loadsthis information into digital library according to a contentconfiguration model 12 defined in the ELOADER.INI configuration file(described below). Content loader 14 interfaces with the digital librarycontent server(s) 18 through the OO API layer 16.

The content loader 14 has three modes of operation: load, delete andpurge.

Load. The purpose of this mode of operation is to load or reload theContent Entities, Associated Components and Attributes into the digitallibrary 20. All Content Component Files are stored as binary largeobjects or BLOBs in the digital library object server 48. All AttributeFiles are parsed and the resultant parametric data is stored in thedigital library server 44.

As previously noted, the input files to the content loader 14 are aProduct Structure File (i.e., a sequence-id.psf), an Attribute file foreach product entity loaded (i.e., sequenceid.atr), a file for eachContent Component (i.e., sequence-id.sgm) and a file for each AssociatedComponent (i.e., sequenceid.cdaOID.gif)

The output of the ELoader will be placed into the appropriate indexclass in the digital library as specified by the configuration modelcontained in the ELOADER.INI file.

-   -   Syntax: ELoader-load <sequence-id>    -   Example #1: ELoader-load 012345678        This load command launches loader 14 into load mode. It looks in        the load directory identified by an ISBN=“012345678” for all of        the Attribute Files, Content Components and Associated        Components stored therein, and processes these files.    -   Example #2: ELoader 012345678.02.00.00        This load command launches loader 14 into load mode. It looks in        the load directory identified by an ISBN=“012345678” for all        Attribute Files, Content Components, and Associated Components        associated with chapter container “012345678.02.00.00”, and        process these files.

Delete. The purpose of this mode of operation is to delete selectedContent Entities, Associated Components and Attributes from the DigitalLibrary. The ELoader will delete all content, attributes, and text indexentries from digital library 20 for the ISBN/sequence number specified,as well as all child content and attributes associated with thatISBN/sequence number.

-   -   Syntax: ELoader-delete <sequence-id>    -   Example #1: ELoader-delete 012345678        This command launches loader 14 into delete mode and deletes all        content and attributes for the prepublished content product        whose ISBN=“012345678”.    -   Example #2: ELoader-delete 012345678.02.00.00        This command launches loader 14 into delete mode and deletes all        entities and attributes for the entity whose sequence        number=“012345678.02.00.00” as well as all of its children. The        rest of the content product remains untouched.

Purge. The purpose of this mode of operation is to purge ContentEntities, Associated Components and Attributes from the Digital Libraryafter a Load that did not complete successfully. Loader 14 deletes allcontent, attributes, and text index entries from the digital library 20even though it is in a partially loaded state.

-   -   Syntax: ELoader-purge <sequence-id>    -   Example: ELoader-purge 012345678        This command launches loader 14 into purge mode and deletes all        content and attributes for the prepublished content product        whose ISBN=“012345678”.

5. Configuration Model

Configuration model 12 is embodied in a configuration file calledELOADER.INL and associated configuration files that it calls. Theconfiguration files contain all of the switches and parameters necessaryto customize the operation of loader 14 to the data model defined above,The primary objective of these files is to minimize the need to changeloader 14 program source code if the data model is modified.

The ELOADER.INI file is organized into several sections with multiplekeywords and values in each section. The LOGON and DEBUG sectionsdescribe parameters that govern the overall loader operation. TheELOADER section and the Individual Group Sections describe the entitytypes that have been defined in the exemplary data model (i.e., theProgram, Product, CBO and Request entity groups). The Individual EntitySections describe each entity type that belongs to a given entity group.The ATTRIBUTES section and the Individual Attribute Sections describethe set of attributes that may be loaded for the entities in the datamodel.

The ELOADER.INI file, the data model file, and each of the individualGROUP attribute files are in the same format as an Attribute file asshown in the examples. The GROUP file is in the PSF format.

a. Structure

-   LOGON Section. This section specifies the digital library USERID and    server names for all operations between content loader 14 and    digital library 20.

KEYWORD VALUE MEANING LIBRARY name The name of the DIGITAL LIBRARYLibrary Server to be used. USERID name The USERID that will be used tologon to DIGITAL LIBRARY. PASSWORD name The PASSWORD of the USERID. TEXTname The name of the client instance of the Text SERVER Miner server.MAX HITS number The maximum number of hits to be returned by EQuery(described subsequently).

-   DEBUG Section. This section specifies internal switch settings that    are only used for debugging, testing, and performance analysis.

KEYWORD VALUE MEANING TRACE 0 No debug trace will be created. 1 Createtrace of internal activity for debugging. This is not a log file.

-   Log files Section. This section specifies the names of the files to    be used for logging and debugging.

KEYWORD VALUE MEANING LOADER name Filename for Loader log. TRACE nameFilename for debug trace.

-   ELOADER Section. This section specifies the name of the    initialization file containing the full data model with all of its    data groups. In other words, it is a pointer to a meta-metadata    file.

KEYWORD VALUE MEANING DATA MODEL Name Filename of a file containing eachGroup name and the name of the Group File. DEFAULT Name Name of thedefault Group. GROUP ROOT ENTITY Name String to be concatenated to theunique ISBN SID of a content object to obtain the root sequence-id.

-   CONTENT CLASSES Section. This section specifies the digital library    content class for each of the possible file extensions of associated    component files.

KEYWORD VALUE MEANING DEFAULT Name BINARY if the component containsnon-human CONTENT readable data. CLASS ASCII if the component containshuman readable data. File extension Name BINARY if the componentcontains non-human readable data. ASCII if the component contains humanreadable data.

-   Groups File. This section lists the names of all hierarchical groups    of entities within the data model. All entity instances that belong    to the same group will be stored in the same set of digital library    index classes. This is a convenient way to manage product-related    entities separately from other business-related entities. There may    be one or more GROUPS in a Groups File.

KEYWORD VALUE MEANING GROUP name All instances of entities within thisEntity group will be stored in the same set of digital library indexclasses. The Entity types that belong to this group may be specified viaENTITY keywords in an Individual Group Section.

-   Individual Group Attribute Files. Each filename in the group    attribute files is the value of one of the GROUP keywords in the    Groups File. It identifies the data model entities that will be    stored together as a related group and the digital library index    class names that will be used to store them. There is one Individual    Group Section for each GROUP keyword in the Groups File.

KEYWORD VALUE MEANING ENTITIES CLASS name The digital library indexclass name that will be used to store all instances of entities thatbelong to this group. ENTITY ID name The digital library attribute namein the ENTITIES Index Class for a unique identifier for the entity. Itis assumed to be unique and an index. ENTITY TYPE name The digitallibrary attribute name in the ENTITIES Index Class for the digitallibrary Type ID of the entity. ENTITY PARENT ID name The digital libraryattribute name in the ENTITIES Index Class for the digital library ItemID of the parent container of this entity. ENTITY CHILD ID name TheDIGITAL LIBRARY Attribute Name in the ENTITIES Index Class for theDIGITAL LIBRARY Item ID of the first child of this entity. ENTITYSIBLING ID name The DIGITAL LIBRARY Attribute Name in the ENTITIES IndexClass for the DIGITAL LIBRARY Item ID of the first sibling of thisentity. ENTITY AUX ID name The DIGITAL LIBRARY Attribute Name in theENTITIES Index Class for the first auxiliary attribute of this entity.ENTITY SUBCOMP ID name The DIGITAL LIBRARY Attribute Name in theENTITIES Index Class for the first associated component of this entity.ASSOC COMP ATTR name The DIGITAL LIBRARY Attribute Name in the NAMECOMPONENTS Index Class for the DIGITAL LIBRARY Item ID of the ENTITIESIndex Class item that owns the COMPONENT item. ASSOC COMP ID name TheDIGITAL LIBRARY Attribute Name in the ATTR NAME COMPONENTS Index Classfor the DIGITAL LIBRARY Item ID of the ENTITIES Index Class item thatowns the COMPONENT item. ATTRIBUTES CLASS name The DIGITAL LIBRARY IndexClass name that will be used to store all attributes that arehierarchical or have multiple instances. ATTR ENTITY ID name The DIGITALLIBRARY Attribute Name in the ATTRIBUTES Index Class for the DIGITALLIBRARY Item ID of the ENTITIES Index Class item that owns the ATTRIBUTEitem. ATTR PARENT ID name The DIGITAL LIBRARY Attribute Name in theATTRIBUTES Index Class for the DIGITAL LIBRARY Item ID of the parentcontainer of this entity. ATTR CHILD ID name The DIGITAL LIBRARYAttribute Name in the ATTRIBUTES Index Class for the DIGITAL LIBRARYItem ID of the first child container of this entity. ATTR SIBLING IDname The DIGITAL LIBRARY Attribute Name in the ATTRIBUTES Index Classfor the DIGITAL LIBRARY Item ID of the next sibling container to thisentity. ATTR NEXT VALUE name The DIGITAL LIBRARY Attribute Name in theATTRIBUTES Index Class for the DIGITAL LIBRARY Item ID of the next valueof this entity. ATTR KEYWORD name The DIGITAL LIBRARY Attribute Name inthe ATTRIBUTES Index Class for the attribute containing the Attribute'sKeyword. ATTR VALUE name The DIGITAL LIBRARY Attribute Name in theATTRIBUTES Index Class for the attribute containing the Attribute'sValue. ENTITY name Name of the entity type of the root entity. ENTITYSTRUCTURE Part Specifies the DIGITAL LIBRARY Part Number PART Numberwhere an internally generated summary of attribute values for thisentity and all of its descendants will be stored.

-   ATTRIBUTE Definitions. Each top-level attribute name that may be    present in a Group Attribute file must have keywords defined.    Attributes that are part of an attribute hierarchy (i.e. sibling    attributes with a parent attribute) are defined by an ATTRIBUTE    keyword within the parent's attribute definition.

KEYWORD VALUE MEANING ATTRIBUTE Defines the beginning of a singleattribute. There may be one or more ATTRIBUTE definitions in Group File.Each attribute name that may be present in an attribute file must havekeywords defined.Attribute Keywords

KEY- WORD VALUE MEANING NAME name The attribute name that will be usedto identify this attribute. TYPE ENTITY The value of this attribute willbe stored as a Primary attribute in the Entities Index Class of theappropriate Entity Group. COMP It uses the DIGITAL LIBRARY attributespecified by the DIGITAL LIBRARY NAME keyword. The value of thisattribute will be AUX stored as a Primary attribute in the ComponentsIndex Class of the appropriate Entity Group. It uses the DIGITAL LIBRARYattribute specified by the DIGITAL LIBRARY NAME keyword. SYS The valueof this attribute will be stored as an Auxiliary attribute along withits keyword. Depending on its position in the attribute file, it willalso contain the DIGITAL LIBRARY Item ID of either an Entities IndexClass or a Components Index Class item of the appropriate Entity Group.The value of this attribute may not be loaded via ELoader and it is notexplicitly stored in the Digital Library. The value of this attributegenerated by the DIGITAL LIBRARY query engine and is available foroutput by EQuery. VALUES 1 (default) This attribute may only have onevalue. The attribute type may be either PRIM or COMP. * This attributemay have zero or more values. The attribute type may only be AUX. Thevalues will always be retrieved in the same order that they are stored.DE- INHERIT If a value is not explicitly specified for this FAULTattribute, the current value of the same attribute of the parent entityis used when the entity is LINK stored (i.e. early binding). If a valueis not explicitly specified for this attribute, the current value of thesame attribute NULL of the parent entity is used when the entity isretrieved (i.e. late binding). If a value is not explicitly specifiedfor this attribute, the value is assumed to be a NULL string (i.e. nobinding). FILE 0 (default) This attribute has a normal text value and isnot a 1 file name. The value of this attribute is a file name. Inaddition to storing the file name as the attribute value, the content ofthe file is stored as a DIGITAL LIBRARY part in the Part numberspecified by the PART keyword. PART n If the PART keyword is specified,the value of the attribute is either a long string or the contents of afile (based on the value of the FILE keyword). The value of the PARTkeyword specifies the DIGITAL LIBRARY Part Number where value ofattribute will be stored. The part will be stored with the item thatcontains the attribute value. This type of attribute may be searchedwith Text search, but not parametric search. DL name The DIGITAL LIBRARYattribute name that will NAME be used to store this attribute. Theattribute type must be ENTITY or COMP. SEARCH P Allow parametric search.The attribute type must T be ENTITY. PT Allow text search. Allowparametric and/or text search. The attribute type must be ENTITY. TEXTname The name of the Text Miner index that will be INDEX used to indexthis attribute value. AT- The presence of an ATTRIBUTE keyword TRIBUTEindicates that the parent attribute has child values. The top-levelattribute type must be AUX. The value of this attribute is theaggregation of all of the values of the attributes that are defined byall of the attribute values that it contains.Example of an ELOADER.INI File:

!LOGON ! LIBRARY:LIBSRVRX ! USERID:chuck ! PASSWORD:chuck ! TEXTSERVER:TM !DEBUG ! TRACE:1 !LOG FILES ! LOADER:Emissary.log !TRACE:ETrace.log !ELOADER ! DATA MODEL:EMISSARY.GROUPS ! DEFAULTGROUP:PRODUCTS ! ROOT ENTITY SID:.00.00.00 !CONTENT CLASSES ! DEFAULTCONTENT CLASS:BINARY ! tiff:BINARY ! gif:BINARY ! jpg:BINARY ! eps:ASCII! sgm:ASCII ! txt:ASCII E.GROUPS file: GROUP:PRODUCTS GROUP:ProgramGroupProgramGroup.ATR file for the group ProgramGroup: !NAME:PROGRAM ;IndexClass control words !ENTITIES CLASS:E_Program !ENTITY ID:E_SeqID !ENTITYTYPE:E_EntityType !ENTITY PARENT ID:S_ParentItem !ENTITY CHILDID:S_ChildItem !ENTITY SIBLING ID:S_SiblingItem !ENTITY AUX ID:S_AuxItem!ENTITY STRUCTURE PART:9 !ASSOC COMP ATTR NAME:Associated_Component!ASSOC COMP ID ATTR NAME:AC_CDAOID !ATTRIBUTES CLASS:E_ProgramAux !ATTRSEQUENCE ID:E_SeqID !ATTR ENTITY ID:S_ProgramItem !ATTR PARENTID:S_ParentItem !ATTR CHILD ID:S_ChildItem !ATTR SIBLINGID:S_SiblingItem !ATTR NEXT VALUE:S_NextValueItem !ATTRKEYWORD:S_Keyword !ATTR VALUE:S_Value ;// Data Model “Entity types”!ENTITY:PROGRAM ;// System attributes !ATTRIBUTE!NAME:Associated_Component !TYPE:SYS !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:AC_CDAOID!TYPE:SYS !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:Hits !TYPE:SYS !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:HitWords!TYPE:SYS !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:Rank !TYPE:SYS !DL NAME:DKRANK ;// Data Model“Entity attributes” !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:PE_Program_ID !TYPE:ENTITY !DLNAME:E_ProgramID !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:PE_Title !TYPE:ENTITY !DL NAME:E_Title!ATTRIBUTE !NAME:PE_Subtitle !TYPE:ENTITY !DL NAME:E_Subtitle !ATTRIBUTE!NAME:PE_AC_Avg_Image_Bytes !TYPE:ENTITY !DL NAME:E_AvgChrPerImage!ATTRIBUTE !NAME:PE_AC_Avg_SGML_Bytes !TYPE:ENTITY !DLNAME:E_AvgChrPerSGMLAC !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:PE_Chars_Per_UPM_Tier!TYPE:ENTITY !DL NAME:E_MaxChrPerUpmTier !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:PE_Req_Count!TYPE:AUX !VALUES:* !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:PE_Related_Material !TYPE:AUX!VALUES:* !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:PE_AC_Group !TYPE:AUX !VALUES:* !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:PE_AC_FormID ! TYPE:AUX !ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:PE_AC_ByteCount !TYPE:AUX !ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:PE_AC_FormDesc ! TYPE:AUX !ATTRIBUTE!NAME:PE_Price_Group !TYPE:AUX !VALUES:* !ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:PE_Country !TYPE:AUX !ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:PE_Monetary_Unit ! TYPE:AUX !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:PE_Min_Order_Price ! TYPE:AUX !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:PE_Base_Cust_Pub_Price ! TYPE:AUX !ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:PE_Base_UPM_Fee! TYPE:AUX !ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:PE_Incr_UPM_Fee ! TYPE:AUX !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:PE_Source_Price_Per_Page ! TYPE:AUX !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:PE_UPM_Bytes_Per_Page ! TYPE:AUX !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:PE_Minimum_Page_Limit ! TYPE:AUX !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:PE_Volume_Page_Limit ! TYPE:AUX !ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:PE_Status !TYPE:ENTITY ! DL NAME:E_Status !ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:PE_CreateDate !TYPE:ENTITY ! DL NAME:E_CreateDate !ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:PE_CreatedBy !TYPE:ENTITY ! DL NAME:E_CreatedBy !ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:PE_LastModifiedDate! TYPE:ENTITY ! DL NAME:E_LastModifiedDate !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:PE_LastModifiedBy ! TYPE:ENTITY ! DL NAME:E_LastModifiedByPRODUCTS.ATR file for the group PRODUCTS:

;Index class info for Products !ENTITIES CLASS:tmpResource2 !ENTITYID:SeqID !ENTITY TYPE:EntityType !ENTITY PARENT ID:ContainerItem !ENTITYCHILD ID:ChildItem !ENTITY SIBLING ID:SiblingItem !ENTITY SUBCOMPID:SubcompItem !ENTITY AUX ID:AuxItem !ASSOC COMP ATTRNAME:Associated_Component !ASSOC COMP ID ATTR NAME:OID !ATTRIBUTESCLASS:tmpAux2 !ATTR ENTITY ID:EResourceItem !ATTR PARENTID:ContainerItem !ATTR CHILD ID:ChildItem !ATTR SIBLING ID:SiblingItem!ATTR NEXT VALUE:NextValueItem !ATTR KEYWORD:EKeyword !ATTR VALUE:EValue;Data Model Root Entity Types for Products Group !ENTITY:Product.c ;DataModel Attributes for Products - i.e., mapping of metadata properties;from PSF attribute files to data locations in the DL data repository!ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:TITLE ! TYPE:ENTITY ! DL NAME:Title !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:PRICE ! TYPE:ENTITY ! DEFAULT:INHERIT ! DL NAME:CharCount!ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:FILE NAME ! TYPE:ENTITY ! DL NAME:ContentFileName !FILE:1 ! PART:1 !ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:INDEX TERM ! TYPE:AUX ! PART:5 ! TEXTINDEX:TIXTERM !ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:ITEM INDEX ! TYPE:AUX ! PART:5 ! TEXTINDEX:TIXTERM !ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:AUTHOR ! TYPE:AUX ! DEFAULT:INHERIT !ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:NAME ! TYPE:AUX ! PART:6 ! TEXT INDEX:TIXTERM !ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:SCHOOL ! TYPE:AUX !ATTRIBUTE !NAME:Associated_Component ! TYPE:COMP ! ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:OID ! TYPE:COMP! DL NAME:ObjectId ! ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:TITLE ! TYPE:COMP ! DL NAME:Title! ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:SIZE ! TYPE:AUX ! ATTRIBUTE ! NAME:COMP FILE NAME !TYPE:COMP ! DL NAME:ContentFileName ! FILE:1 ! PART:1B. Selecting Content for a Compilation of Content

The selection path for creating a compilation of content is shown inFIG. 6. This path allows a user to interface with the digital library 20to retrieve and view content objects stored therein, select objects forinclusion in a compilation of content, create new objects for inclusionin the compilation and for storage in the digital library 20, and submitthe completed compilation for approval.

In brief, block 22 represents a user interface application 22 whichpreferably runs within a standard web browser. It comprises HTML andJavascript applications that provide a user interface and some amount ofapplication function such as searching, viewing, selecting, creating,editing, and organizing content accessed from the content server(s). Theuser creates a compilation in the form of a custom content outline(CCO), which is essentially a formatted text document that includespointers to the actual content to be included in the final compilation.In the current example for creating custom textbooks, the CCO is calleda custom book outline or CBO.

The user-interface application 22 communicates through a web server 26to an application layer 28. Application layer 28 preferably comprises aset of PERL applications that control some user interface transactions(e.g., login procedures), retrieve data for presentation to the user,perform CCO manipulation and submission, and forward commands to the APILayer to communicate actions requested by the user.

Application layer 28 accesses the content server(s) 18 via API layer 30.The API layer 30 preferably consists of a collection of C++ routinesthat perform discrete functions such as the actual CCO manipulationfunctions and digital library 20 functions (e.g., search and retrieve).It also includes a PERL/C++ glue layer between the C++ routines andapplication layer 28 for bridging parameter lists between C++ and PERL.The API layer 30 is provided to map digital library 20 more closely tothe customer's website and application program workflow. Underneath,this API 30 makes use of the digital library API 16 toquery/update/delete and retrieve data from digital library 20.

1. Custom Book Outline

Prior to submission, a custom book outline is preferably an abstractrepresentation of the compilation of content being created. For example,the CBO may be a hierarchical outline of the contents to be included ina compilation of content. At this point, it contains only references tothe actual content to be included in the final work. This format is moreefficient than pulling in content at creation time because it avoidsretrieval and manipulation of large BLOBs of information until the CBOis in its final form.

In the present example, the CBO at creation time is a formatted textdocument comprising a parsable formatted file like the “PSF” filetypepreviously described. Like the content product PSF files, the CBO ismerely an outline with references to the content entities to be includedtherein. One difference is that a CBO may be a composite PSF+ATRfiletype, including attributes particular to the CBO such as author andprice. This is the case in the present embodiment.

“Entities” once again refers to the content hierarchy definition Forexample, the hierarchy definition of a textbook includes containersrepresenting the higher levels of the hierarchy (cbo.c, volume.c andchapter.c). The smallest entity of the hierarchy is a section. Eachentity in the CBO is represented by a sequence ID in the same format aspreviously described with reference to product entities. The sequence IDof a container entity is used to identify all subentities of thatcontainer. The sequence ID's of a leaf node is used to reference theactual content associated with that node.

A CBO according to the present example is stored as a digital librarypart Its attributes are also contained in a row of a relational CBOindex class defined by the Custom Book Outline Index Class, and itsunique identifier for this particular implementation is stored in theUser Table, although it could also be stored in the CBO index class TheUser Table contains this reference for the purpose of identifying thecurrent CBO a user is working with. This allows for the user to log offand log back in and return to the previous CBO “work in progress”. Therow in the CBO index class includes references to the CBO part number,as well as any associated parts.

FIG. 7 depicts a row 82 representing a CBO. It includes a CBOidentifier, CBO attributes, and pointers to one or more PSF files or“parts” associated with the CBO. The first part contains the parsableformatted text outline representing the compilation of content, which inturn includes references to actual product content making up the CBO. Asecond part comprises a backup downlevel copy of the first part that isused to undo previous transactions. A third part, designated with thenumber 50 or higher, represents any user-provided content that has beenadded to the CBO. Each part of this type includes pointers to the actualuser-provided content, which is stored in digital library 20.

An example of a CBO is shown below.

CBO.C:OW1T8$UEB4H3@SE7 !PE_ID:FE !Title:Student Loans !Userid:DaveBaer!Undoable:FALSE !Product_Type:CBO !Create_Date:20001209203630!Last_Modified_Date:20001214113615 !Status:0!CBO_State_Changed_Date:20001209203630!UPM_Terms_And_Conditions_Date:20001214 11:36:13 !Acknowledgement:!Contrib_Group: !Price:2216 !UPM_Price:1000 !Page_Count:21.8!Char_Count:186 !Nextchapter:2 !ECtISGMLChrPerPage:3800!ECtIAvgChrPerImage:0 !ECtIAvgChrPerSMGLAC:0 !ECtIMaxChrPerUPMTier:2000!ECtISourcePricePerPage:10 !ECtIUPMBasePrice:1000 !ECtIUPMIncrPrice:10!Country_Code:US !PE_Volume_Page_Limit:480 !PE_Minimum_Page_Limit:80!PE_Min_Order_Price:1000 !UPM_Bytes_Per_Page:1000 !Base_Cost:1000VOLUME.C:V1 !UPM_price:0 !Title:My New ESource Book created on12/09/2000 at 20:36:28 Volume Number 1 !Price:216 !Product_Type:!Publication_Media_Type: !Page_Count:21.8 FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:!Title:Table of Contents !Page_Count:6 !Price:60 FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:!Title:Preface !Page_Count:9 !Price:90 CHAPTER.C:C1 !Title:New Chapter!Price:16 !Page_Count:1.8 SECTION:0137842244.02.02.00 !Title: BackgroundIdeas !SGML_Char_Cnt:2111 !PE_ID:FE !Page_Count:0.6 !Info_Generated:1!Price:6 SECTION:0137842244.02.03.00 !Title:Why Study EngineeringEthics? !SGML_Char_Cnt:3905 !PE_ID:FE !Page_Count:1.0 !Info_Generated:1!Price:10 UPM SECTION:50 !Title:My New UPM Title !SGML_Char_Cnt:186!AC_Subdoc_Cnt:0 !AC_Image_Cnt:0 !Page_Count:0.2 !Price:0FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT: !Title:Index !Page_Count:5 !Price:50Attributes are identified by the “!” character. The first line containsa 16 byte CBO_ID, i.e., This is the itemid defined previously in thediscussion of the digital library 20. The CBO_ID is the uniqueidentifier for each row in the CustomBookOutline index class.

The outlined structure is primarily defined by lines below the Volume.Ccontainer definition and includes the title of the book, a table ofcontents, a chapter container, two product sections and theircorresponding sequence identifiers, and a user provided section and itscorresponding part number (UPM SECTION:50). The text above the Volume.Cis defining author, pricing, and other desired variables. This format isparsed by the Edit.cgi script within application layer 28 and displayedto the user on a web interface 22 screen.

A CBO according to the present example is presented to the system userthrough the web user interface 22 as will be described subsequently.

2. Application Layer and API Layer

Application layer 28 and API layer 30 interoperate to execute a group offunctions defined to enable creation, submission and request processingof a CBO. The functions are listed below and described subsequently withreference to specific CBO tasks. Each function is a logical procedure,preferably implemented in C++, that defines a set of function rules andincludes calls to digital library functions necessary to perform thefunction (e.g. Queries, writes, etc.). In other words, each function isan encapsulation of a series of oft-repeated functional steps whichfacilitates the creation and processing of a CBO. Digital libraryfunction calls are made through the digital library Client OO API 42. Adefinition of digital library 20 OO API function calls utilized by APIlayer 30 is provided in the “IBM Digital Library Programming ReferenceVersion 2”, Second Edition (September 1997), and rules for making thesefunction calls are provided in the “IBM Digital Library Guide toObject-Oriented and Internet Application Programming Version 2”, SecondEdition (September 1997), both available from IBM Corporation.

Each function in API layer 30 has a corresponding function inapplication layer 28. In the present embodiment, the application layerfunctions are implemented as Perl scripts. These scripts receive Perlinput parameters from Perl function calls residing in the applicationlayer 28. The Perl scripts translate the Perl arguments received intoequivalent C++ parameters and then issue calls to their correspondingC++ functions in API layer 30. The API layer functions then execute theactual function steps and return C++ output parameters to theircorresponding Perl functions. The Perl functions then translate the C++arguments into equivalent Perl arguments.

CBO Functions

-   -   ECBOCreate    -   ECBOClone    -   ECBOAddContent    -   ECBONewContainer    -   ECBORemoveContent    -   ECBODelete    -   ECBOMoveContent    -   ECBORelocateContent    -   ECBOSetTitle    -   ECBOGet    -   ECBOList    -   ECBOListByCreator    -   ECBOUndo    -   ECBOSetState    -   ECBOAddUPM    -   ECBOGetUPM    -   ECBOSetTerms    -   ECBOSubmit    -   CBOCheckPolicies        Prepublished Content Product Support Functions    -   EProductGetOutline    -   EProductSetState    -   EGetHTML        Miscellaneous Support Functions    -   EAdminPopulatePageAndPrice    -   EDLAuthCheck    -   EGetProgramAttributes

It is worthwhile noting at this point that the API layer 30 alsoincludes Request functions. In the present embodiment the Requestfunctions (described with reference to the CBO approval path, below),are called by scripts residing in Request Generator 32 rather thanapplication layer 28. However, this architecture is a matter of designchoice and the skilled artisan will appreciate that the Request functioncalls may be contained in the application layer 28 without departingfrom the essence of the invention.

Request Processing Support Functions

-   -   ErequestUpdateStatus    -   ErequestAssigniSBN    -   ErequestList    -   ErequestGet    -   ErequestExistsforCBO    -   ErequestGetForCBO

3. Creating a Custom Book Outline

A user creates a custom book outline by selecting content stored in thedata repository 20 through a web-based user interface 22. The user ispresented with input screens that lead him through registration, systemlogin, and CBO creation, manipulation and submission. The format andcontent of the screens is defined by HTML passed to the web browser 26from functional modules residing in application layer 28 that areinvoked by the user's actions. The format may be changed if the systemis modified for different purposes. Javascripts in the web browser 26accept the HTML and use it to build web pages according to knownmethods. The Javascripts add static elements such as vertical andhorizontal navigation bars.

The sequence of events for creating a custom book outline, including adescription of the user interface input screens and their underlyingfunctional modules, will now be described.

Login/Create New Account

A user entering the system of the present invention is first presentedwith a login screen as shown in FIG. 8A. The format and content of thelogin screen are defined by a login procedure. The screen includes inputfields 104, 106 for receiving a username and password.

If the user is new to the system, he must first register for a usernameby clicking on the register button 102. Clicking on register buttoninvokes a registration procedure and brings up a new screen as shown inFIG. 8B containing a plurality of input fields. The user is prompted toenter a desired username and other information that will be stored bythe system in connection with the user and may later be used toconfigure the CBO user interface. In the present example, thisinformation is tailored to a university professor who will be creating atextbook in a particular discipline and includes, for example, his name,address, university, department, challenge question and secret response.It includes most of the information listed in the USERS Table datamodel.

Once the user's information is entered, the user clicks on button 110.The information is retrieved and forwarded with additional informationsuch as a timestamp for storage in an account database. The accountdatabase may be the relational database 46 associated with libraryserver 44, for example. Alternatively, an auxiliary database may beprovided that is linked directly to the application layer 28. In thepresent example, an auxiliary database was used. The database stores theinformation according to the template provided by the USERS Table datamodel.

A confirmation screen is displayed next as shown in FIG. 8C with theuserid and a temporary password. The user may now log into the system byclicking on the login button 112. This action causes the user to bereturned to the login screen of FIG. 8A and control to return to thelogin procedure. The user then enters his new id and password.

New and returning users complete the login process by clicking on button108. This action causes a query to be issued to the account database todetermine if the username and password match the USER_ID and PASSWORDcolumns of any rows in the USERS Table. If there is no match, an errormessage is returned to the user and he is prompted to reenter his ID. Ifthere is a match, the user information is retrieved. This informationincludes an active CBO_ID. For returning users, it represents the lastCBO that the user was working on.

In the case of a new user logging onto the system for the first time,the ECBOCreate, EDLAuthCheck and ECBOSetState functions described beloware invoked.

ECBOCreate

Description

This function creates a new, skeleton CBO, populates whatever data thatit knows at this time, and then stores it into the Digital Library. Thisprocedure is invoked whenever a user:

-   1. logs into the web site for the first time-   2. clears an active CBO-   3. adds a new CBO to his list of CBO's

Functional Processing

-   1. Verify that the PROGRAM ID passed is valid.-   2. Create a new CBO with the user's userid and generate a temporary    title. The CBO is a parsable formatted text (i.e., PSF) file.-   3. Mark the CBO status as active (CBO Status=“1”) with a call to    ECBOSetState.-   4. Extract the Program variables related to pricing and virtual page    count, storing them in the CBO (described subsequently).-   5. Write the CBO to the digital library 20. Storing a copy of the    CBO in the client cache is automatically handled by the digital    library client 16.-   6. Parameter List

Inputs Username Password Hostname Program id Userid Title Distributioncountry Monetary unit Composition set Outputs CBO id

Index Classes

-   -   CustomBookOutline    -   Program    -   ProgramAux        EDLAuthCheck

Description

Before performing any operation, make sure the system-provided datastorelogin parameters are valid.

Functional Processing

-   I. Verify that the datastore usemame, password and hostname passed    are valid by connecting to the DL datastore.-   II. Disconnect from the digital library datastore.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Outputs ErrorsRC_DS_NOCONNECTION RC_DS_NOTAUTHORIZED RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

None.

ECBOSetState

Description

This function changes the approval status of a CBO as it moves throughthe workflow from creation, to submission, to approval/retum/rejection,to printing through the back-end custom publishing process.

Functional Processing

-   I. Verify that the CBO id passed is valid.-   II. Verify that the CBO status passed is valid (“1”, “2”, “3”, or    “4”).-   III. Update the CBO status in the active CBO.-   IV. Remove all Order Requests for the active CBO if the CBO status    is being set to Active.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Userid CBO id CBO state OutputsErrors RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   CustomBookOutline    -   Request        An new CBO PSF file will look like this:

CBO.C:OW1T8$UEB4H3@SE7 !PE_ID:FE !Title:My New ESource Book created on12/09/2000 at 20:36:28 !Userid:DaveBaer !Undoable:FALSE!Product_Type:CBO !Create_Date:20001209203630!Last_Modified_Date:20001209203630 !Status:0!CBO_State_Changed_Date:20001209203630 !UPM_Terms_And_Conditions_Date:!Acknowledgement: !Contrib_Group: !Price:1000 !UPM_Price:0 !Page_Count:0!Char_Count:0 !Nextchapter:1 !ECtISGMLChrPerPage:3800!ECtIAvgChrPerImage:0 !ECtIAVgChrPerSMGLAC:0 !ECtIMaxChrPerUPMTier:2000!ECtISourcePricePerPage:10 !ECtIUPMBasePrice:1000 !ECtIUPMIncrPrice:10!Country_Code:US !PE_Volume_Page_Limit:480 !PE_Minimum_Page_Limit:80!PE_Min_Order_Price:1000 !UPM_Bytes_Per_Page:1000 !Base_Cost:1000VOLUME.C:V1 !UPM_price:0 !Title:My New ESource Book created on12/09/2000 at 20:36:28 Volume Number 1 !Price:0 !Product_Type:!Publication_Media_Type: !Page_Count:0

In addition, a cookie is created and stored in the web browser's memoryincluding the user's name, userid, password and active CBO_ID. Thiscookie is used to establish connections to the content management systemas necessary and transparently to the user, according to conventionalmethods.

A welcome screen is presented to the new user by a MYBOOKOUTLINEprocedure, as shown in FIG. 9A. A first section 111 identifies the userand information about the user—in this case her university name,department and guest access level. A second section 113 lists the user'snew custom book outline. The list includes a “My Custom Book” columncontaining a temporary title and creation date, a “Last Date” columnreflecting the CBO's last date of modification, a “Status” columnindicating that the CBO is active, and a “Request ID” column that isnull at this point to indicate that the CBO has not been submitted forapproval.

The user now has two options: 1) he may select the new CBO formodification by clicking on the temporary CBO title, which is ahypertext link to the new CBO.; or 2) he may create another CBO byclicking on CBO button 118. Button 118 once again invokes the ECBOCreateprocedure. Clicking on the CBO title causes the MYBOOKOUTLINE procedureto issue a call to the ECBOGet procedure to retrieve the CBO formattedtext from the digital library 20. It then parses the text and displaysthe empty CBO to the user as shown in FIG. 10A. The ECBOGet procedure isdescribed below.

ECBOGet

Description

The content of the custom book outline/ICBO is returned.

Functional Processing

-   1. Verify that the CBO id passed is valid.-   2. Retrieve content of the CBO.-   3. Add Preface and Table of Contents front matter elements to the    very beginning of the CBO:-   4. Add the Index back matter element to the very end of the CBO:-   5. Pricing and virtual page counts are pre-determined for these    front or back matter elements and are hard-coded at this time. The    attributes are adjusted for the affected Volumes as well as the CBO    totals.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Userid CBO id Outputs CBOdescription Errors RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   CustomBookOutline

The custom book outline is displayed in a first portion 122 of thescreen of FIG. 10A. It includes the temporary title and creation date128. A “Content” column 130 shows the default format that initiallyincludes the volume, table of contents, preface and index. A pricecolumn 132 reflects the price of the compilation calculated thus far, asis determined by prices associated with the elements of column 130.Similarly, a “Pgs” column 134 reflects a page count calculated so far,as determined by page estimates for the elements of column 130.

The user may elect to return to the Welcome page by clicking on “CBO”button 119. Section 124 of the screen is provided to allow the user toadd new chapters to the CBO. This function will be described in moredetail subsequently. Section 126 enables the user to change anycontainer (book, volume, chapter) or noncontainer (section) title byselecting the entity type via pull-down menu 125 and inserting the newtitle in entry field 127, then clicking on “Change” button 129. In thepresent example, let us assume that the user wishes to change the booktitle to “Internet Basics”. Entity type “book” has been selected in menu125 and the desired title has been inserted in field 127. By clicking onbutton 129, the ECBOSetTitle procedure is invoked, as described below.

ECBOSetTitle

Description

This modifies the book and container/chapter titles of the active CBO towhatever the user specifies.

Functional Processing

-   1. Verify that the CBO id passed is valid.-   2. Verify that the target sequence id passed exists in the CBO.    Otherwise, the target becomes the CBO itself.-   3. Set the title of the target element within the CBO.-   4. When renaming, determine if the title is protected and cannot be    changed-   5. When renaming, the title text is validated by Javascript on the    web page-   6. When renaming, the “<” and “>” symbols will be changed to HTML    equivalents: “&It”; “&gt”

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Userid CBO id Target id TitleOutputs New CBO description Errors RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   CustomBookOutline

FIG. 10B shows the CBO with its new title. Let us assume that the usernow wishes to add preexisting content to the CBO.

Adding Prepublished Content to a CBO

There are two methods for selecting preexisting content viewing a“bookshelf” of content available to the user, or searching the storedcontent Searching shall be described in more detail subsequently.

To access a bookshelf, the user clicks on the “Library” tab 136 on thevertical menu bar. This action invokes a BrowseBookshelf procedure toretrieve all or a subset of the prepublished content stored in thedigital library 20. For convenience, a subset or “bookshelf” may betailored to the particular user. In the present example, content isgrouped into academic programs such as Engineering, Mathematics,English, etc. Each program is assigned a unique ProgramID, and eachprogram entity's ProgramID is stored in the Product Index class definedby the Product Entity Index Classes. Users are assigned to a programbased upon department information entered at the time of systemregistration.

An exemplary bookshelf tailored to an Engineering program is shown inthe user-interface screen of FIG. 11. It includes a list of prepublishedbooks whose titles are hypertext links to their corresponding PSF files.By clicking on one of these titles 138, the user invokes theEProductGetOutline procedure call which retrieves the PSF file, parsesit, and displays it to the user as shown in FIG. 12. TheEProductGetOutline function is described below:

EProductGetOutline

Description

This returns attribute information about an existing product stored inthe digital library. It allows calling applications to retrieve the onlythe attributes that it needs or all attributes. It will returnattributes for all entities within the product hierarchy, exposing theproduct outline. Sysadmin prepubcall when book becomes public. Returnsentire outline/browse of bookshelf

Functional Processing

-   I. Search for any existing prepublished content product with the    product id passed.-   II. Verify that there is exactly one match for the product id.-   III. If the attribute list is not null, only those attributes in the    list are of interest.    -   A. Retrieve the requested attributes along with the various        levels of entities in the existing copyright product    -   B. If an attribute of interest is not found for the existing        copyright product, an attribute value of null is assumed.-   IV. If the attribute list is null, all attributes are of interest.    -   A. Retrieve all attributes along with the various levels of        entities in the existing copyright product.    -   B. Retrieve the program-specific attributes related to pricing        and virtual page count.    -   C. Calculate and update the pricing and virtual page count        information for each level of entities in the existing copyright        product.-   V. Export the attributes and entities description into the output    buffer.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Product id Attribute listDistribution country Monetary unit Composition set Outputs Productdescription Errors RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   Product    -   ProductAux    -   Program    -   ProgramAux

The selected book is displayed by chapter as defined by the PSF format.A chapter may be expanded to view its sections by clicking on itscorresponding expand button 141. In FIG. 12, chapters 1 and 7 have beenexpanded. Each chapter and section is provided with a select box 145.The user selects content for inclusion in his custom book by checkingthe boxes next to the chapters and sections he desires. In the exampleof FIG. 12, Chapters 1 146 and 7 148 have been selected According to thepresent embodiment, a user can not add chapters and sections at the sametime. However, it should be apparent to the user that thisimplementation is merely a matter of design choice, ant that if desired,chapters and sections could be added at the same time.

Once selection is complete, the user clicks on the “Add to Book” button144 on the vertical menu bar. This action adds the selected text to theCBO by invoking the ECBOAddContent procedure described below.

ECBOAddContent

Description

There are two types of content: (chapters and sections) also referred toas containers and non-containers that can be added using this function.ECBOAddContent defines separate processes depending on the content typebeing added.

This function adds pre-published content into the CBO once the user hasselected which content he wants to include in his CBO. The functionverifies rights and pre-requisite content before the content isincluded. Additional volumes are constructed on an as needed basis.

Functional Processing

-   1. Verify that the CBO id passed is valid.-   2. Check the country code in the CBO.-   3. Verify that the CBO chapter location reference is valid if    specified.-   4. Verify that each piece of content does not already exist in the    CBO.-   5. For content containers (e.g. Chapter):    -   a) Retrieve the piece of content by its content id (sequence        number).    -   b) Verify that the piece of content is indeed a container.    -   c) Validate the right to distribute it.    -   d) Validate the right to combine it with other contents in the        CBO.    -   e) If the CBO chapter location reference is valid, add the        content container after the chapter location reference.    -   f) If the CBO chapter location reference is null or invalid, add        the piece of content to the end of the CBO. This situation        occurs when a CBO contains no chapters (a.k.a. empty).-   6. For content components (e.g. Sections):    -   a) Retrieve the piece of content by sequence id.    -   b) Verify that the piece of content is indeed a non-container.    -   c) Validate the right to distribute it.    -   d) Validate the right to combine it with other contents in the        CBO.    -   e) If the CBO chapter location reference is valid, add the piece        of content to the end of the chapter location referenced,        immediately before any back matter elements in that chapter.    -   f) If the CBO chapter location reference is null or invalid,        return error.-   7. For content components (e.g. Section), process prerequisites    listed one at a time:    -   a) Retrieve the piece of prerequisite content by sequence id.    -   b) Validate the right to distribute it.    -   c) Validate the right to combine it with other contents in the        CBO.    -   d) If the piece of pre-requisite content does not already exist        in the CBO, add it to the end of the chapter location        referenced, immediately before any back matter elements. Mark it        as pre-requisite, so it cannot be deleted later.    -   e) If the piece of pre-requisite content already exists in the        CBO, but it has never been pre-requisite before, downgrade it to        the pre-requisite status so it cannot be deleted later. Location        of the piece of pre-requisite content remains unchanged.    -   f) If the piece of pre-requisite content already exists in the        CBO, and is already in pre-requisite status, update the        pre-requisite information with the current requiring content id.        Location of the piece of pre-requisite content remains        unchanged.-   9. Perform volume management (described subsequently).-   10. Perform pricing and page count calculations (described    subsequently).

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Userid CBO id Content id listContent id count Container flag CBO chapter location reference OutputsNew CBO description if OK; Offending content ids if error ErrorsRC_NOT_FOUND RC_DUPLICATE_NOT_ALLOWED RC_CONTENT_NOT_CHAPTERRC_CBO_NO_VOLUME RC_INVALID_CBO RC_BAD_CHAPTER RC_BAD_CONTENTRC_INVALID_PREREQ RC_NO_DIST_RIGHTS RC_NOT_COMB_RIGHTS

Index Classes

-   -   CustomBookOutline    -   Rights    -   RightsAux    -   Prereq    -   PrereqAux    -   Product

Steps 6.d) and 7.c) above are performed to prevent mutually exclusivecontent entities stored in the digital library from being included thesame compilation of content. The substeps necessary to perform thismutual exclusion are defined subsequently. When a content entity isadded to a CBO, the Product Index class is referenced to determine ifthe content entity is mutually exclusive of any other content entities.If it is, then the CBO is checked to determine if any of the mutuallyexclusive content entities already exists in the compilation. If not,the content entity is added to the compilation, but if a mutuallyexclusive content entity is present, the add fails and the user is givenan error message.

After the selected content is added to the CBO, the user is returned tothe CBO screen and is able to view his new additions (see FIG. 1 3A). Inthe present example, the ECBOAddContent procedure has retrieved andinserted the titles of all of the sections 150 of selected chapter 1 146and the selected sections 152 of Chapter 7 148, and has assigned newchapter and section numbers accordingly.

It has also retrieved and inserted references to front and back matter154 associated with the selected content (e.g., introductory text,summary text and sample problems). Selection boxes 157 are provided nextto each chapter title and section title to facilitate further editing ofthe CBO.

Let us now assume that the user wishes to add his own content to theCBO.

Adding User-Provided Content to a CBO

User Provided Material (UPM) is content an instructor contributes to aCBO that is not part of the pre-published content. UPM consists of twocomponents: title and content. The title of the UPM is inserted into theCBO's index class of contents and added to the content outline. Thecontent is stored as a part in digital library 20. UPM can be added ateither the chapter or section level. In other words, UPM can be siblingsof chapters or sections.

The user first selects a location at which the UPM content is to beinserted using pull-down menu 155 (see FIG. 13). In the present example,the user may select to add the UPM to one of the existing chapters or toa new, untitled chapter. New chapter is selected in this case (notshown). The user then clicks on the “Add Content” button 156. Thisaction invokes a UPM procedure which displays a “My Custom Content”screen as shown in FIG. 14. The user enters a title in title field 158,and the UPM content in entry window 160. The content may be designatedas standard text or as a code sample. Once the content has been entered,the user clicks on button 162 to add the content to the CBO. This actioninvokes the ECBOAddUPM procedure described below. In the presentexample, ECBOSetTerms procedure is also invoked the first time the usercreates UPM.

ECBOSetTerms

Description

The first time an UPM is created in the active CBO, the user is firstasked to read the UPM terms and conditions (e.g., copyright ownership,etc.). If the user accepts them, the date/time stamp of the acceptanceis recorded with the CBO.

Functional Processing

-   I. Verify that the CBO id passed is valid.-   II. Set the UPM terms and conditions date/time stamp to the time    string passed in the active CBO.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Userid CBO id Time stringOutputs Errors RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   E_CustomBookOutline        ECOBOAddUPM

Description

This function adds the UPM that a user has entered into the webapplication into the CBO. ECBOAddUPM validates the designated insertlocation and stores the UPM with its associated location attributes inthe digital library. The UPM title and size are stored within the CBOpart. The UPM text is stored in a separate part The UPM is stored as apart whose number is determined by a UPM counter initialized to 50. Thisfunction performs the following tasks.

Functional Processing

-   1. Verify that the CBO id passed is valid.-   2. Verify that the container id passed is valid, if specified.-   3. Verify that the UPM id passed is valid, if specified.-   4. If the UPM id passed is null, this is a UPM add operation:    -   a) Create a new UPM with the passed UPM title and text blob as        the content. The UPM Title is placed into the CBO part and the        content is placed into a new UPM part having a unique identifier        defined by the attribute, S_LastUpmPartID which is an        incremental counter. S_LastUpmPartID, resides in the        E_CustomBookOutline index class and contains the UPM id used in        the creation process. Once the UPM is stored within DL, this        attribute is incremented.    -   b) If the container id passed is null or invalid, insert the UPM        at the end of the last chapter in the CBO, before any back        matter elements in the chapter.    -   c) If the container id passed is valid, insert the UPM at the        end of the container referenced, before any back matter elements        in the container.    -   d) Note that an UPM add operation is always in the context of a        container. The UPM can be moved outside the container as needed.-   5. If the UPM id passed is not null, this is an UPM update    operation.    -   a) Verify that the UPM does exist in the CBO.    -   b) Update the content of the UPM with the UPM text blob passed.    -   c) The location of the UPM remains unchanged.-   6. Set the UPM Title attribute in the CBO to the title passed.-   7. Volume size management is performed. If an add or update causes    the total virtual page count of the current volume to go above or    below the volume virtual page count limit, the volumes are    reorganized.-   8. Pricing and virtual page count calculations are performed for    each add or update operation. The net results are stored as    attributes for the affected Chapter, Volumes as well as the CBO    totals.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Userid CBO id Container id TitleUPM id UPM text blob Outputs New CBO description Errors RC_NOT_FOUNDRC_INVALID_CBO RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

After the UPM has been added to the CBO, the user is returned to the CBOscreen where he can view the newly added material 164 (see FIG. 15A).

User-provided material may be edited by clicking on the UPM title, whichis a hypertext link to the UPM part. This action invokes the ECBOGetUPMprocedure to retrieves the UPM part and display it in editing window 160of the “My Custom Content” screen (FIG. 14).

ECBOGetUPM

Description

This will return the UPM content of an UPM section, including all of theUPM elements.

Functional Processing

-   I. Verify that the CBO id passed is valid.-   II. Verify that the UPM id passed is valid.-   III. Retrieve the content of the UPM.    -   A. If there is one single element in the UPM, retrieve its        content into a text buffer.    -   B. If there are multiple elements in the UPM, retrieve all their        contents in one single text buffer, in the order they appear in        the UPM.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Userid CBO id UPM id Outputs UPMtext blob Errors RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   CustomBookOutline        Once the user has entered his desired changes, he clicks on        button 162 and once again invokes the ECBOAddUPM procedure. This        time, the procedure recognizes the UPM as an update and follows        the alternate processing path described above.

Adding New Containers to the CBO

FIG. 15B represents the lower portion of the “My Book Outline” screen,including the “Add” and “Change” sections 124, 126 previously described.We will now assume that the user wishes to add a custom container (i.e.,chapter) to the CBO in FIG. 15A. To do so, he enters a desired containertitle in field 121 and clicks on the “Add” button 124. This actioninvokes the ECBONewContainer procedure described below.

ECBONewContainer

Description

This function will add a new container (e.g. chapter) into the usersactive CBO. It does not add content to the container.

Functional Processing

-   I. Verify that the CBO id passed is valid.-   II. Verify that the container type passed is valid.-   III. Create a new empty container at the end of the CBO.-   IV. Set the title attribute to the container title if specified;    otherwise set the title to the default.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Userid CBO id Container typeContainer title Output flag Outputs New CBO description if output flag0; New container id if output flag 1 Errors RC_NOT_FOUNDRC_INVALID_CONTAINER_TYPE

Index Classes

-   -   CustomBookOutline

The new container 165 is added to the CBO as shown in FIG. 16. We willnow assume that the user wishes to rearrange the entities in his CBO.

Moving and Relocating Content

There are two separate processes involving the movement of contentwithin a CBO. These processes are: moving and relocating. Moving contentinvolves some piece of content moving up or down by one item within aCBO. Relocation involves moving a piece of content to some otherlocation within the CBO. Sections, UPM and chapters are the onlyentities permitted to be moved within a CBO. For a movement orrelocation task to complete without error, the following rules must beobeyed.

-   1. A section must reside within a chapter-   2. A chapter must reside within a volume-   3. UPM must reside within either a chapter or a volume-   4. A chapter/UPM is not permitted before a volume's front matter-   5. A chapter/UPM is not permitted after a volume's back matter-   6. A section is not permitted before a chapter's front matter-   7. A section is not permitted after a chapter's back matter-   8. All content must move/relocate without error, or none of the    content is moved/relocated.

Content is moved within a CBO via the “My Book Outline” display screen(see FIG. 16). A user selects the content to be moved by checking itscorresponding select box. In the present example, section 1.3 has beenselected 166. He then specifies a target location using drop down box168. Within the box the user may select to move an entity up or down (byone of the same entity), select an existing chapter from a current listof chapter titles, or create a new untitled chapter. In the presentexample, the user has selected to move section 1.3 to existing Chapter4. After selection, the user clicks on the “Move Items” button 170.

If the user selects to move content up or down, the ECBOMoveContentfunction is invoked. If he selects to move content to a differentchapter or a new chapter, the ECBORelocateContent function is invoked.Both functions are described below. Both procedures cause page and pricetotals to be recalculated and stored in digital library via theEAdminPopulatePageAndPrice procedure, also described below.

ECBOMoveContent

Description

This function will move content up and down within the CBO per theinstructors' direction. This function permits moving one or more piecesof similar content in the same call. Similar content is defined to beeither all sections and UPM's or all chapters, but not hybrids of thetwo. It will make sure that all rules are adhered to and will alsorequest Volume Size Management when necessary.

Functional Processing

-   1. Verify that the CBO id passed is valid.-   2. Verify that selected content is either all chapter containers or    all sections, but not a mixture of both.-   3. Contents listed are moved one at a time. For moving up, the    contents are processed in the order listed. For moving down, the    contents are processed in the reverse order.-   4. Verify that the piece of content does exist in the CBO.-   5. Verify that the piece of content is not a front or back matter    element. Front or back matter elements can only be moved implicitly    when an entire chapter is moved.-   6. When moving containers down (e.g. Chapter):    -   a) Verify that after this piece of container content in the CBO,        there is at least one more piece of content at the same level        (e.g. Chapter, UPM Section outside a chapter).    -   b) Move the piece of container content to the position after        that next piece of content.-   7. When moving content components Sections down:    -   a) If it is the last section besides any back matter elements in        a chapter, verify that chapter is not the last chapter in the        CBO.    -   b) Move the piece of content down by one position, but skip over        any front or back matter elements. If leaving a chapter, it is        moved to the beginning of the next chapter.-   8. When moving content component UPM Sections down:    -   a) If i is outside chapters, verify that it is not the very last        element in the CBO.    -   b) Move the piece of content down by one position, but skip over        any front or back matter elements. If leaving a chapter, move it        to the position immediately after the chapter thus at the same        level as a chapter. H entering a chapter, move it after any lead        front matter in the chapter.-   9. When moving containers up:    -   a) Verify that before this piece of container content in the        CBO, there is at least one more piece of content prior to it at        the same level (e.g. Chapter, UPM Section outside a chapter).    -   b) Move the piece of container content to the position before        that previous piece of content.-   10. When moving content components up:    -   a) If it is the first section besides any front matter elements        in a chapter, verify that chapter is not the first chapter in        the CBO.    -   b) Move the piece of content up by one position, but skip over        any front or back mater elements. If leaving a chapter, it is        moved to the end of the previous chapter.-   11. When moving content component UPM Sections up:    -   a) If it is outside chapters, verify that it is not the very        first element in the CBO.    -   b) Move the piece of content up by one position, but skip over        any front or back mater elements. If leaving a chapter, it is        moved to the position immediately before the chapter thus at the        same level as a chapter. If entering a chapter, move it before        any trailing back matter in the chapter.        -   If a move causes the total virtual page count of the current            volume to go above or below the volume virtual page count            limit, the volumes are reorganized.-   12. Pricing and virtual page count calculations (described    subsequently) are performed for each move operation and stored in    digital library via the EAdminPopulatePageAndPrice procedure. The    net results are stored as attributes for the affected Chapters,    Volumes as well as the CBO totals.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Userid CBO id Content id listContent id count Container flag Move flag Outputs New CBO description ifOK; Offending content ids if error Errors RC_NOT_FOUND RC_INVALID_CBORC_INVALID_MOVE

Index Classes

-   -   CustomBookOutline        ECBORelocateContent

Description

This will relocate content to a specific location within the same CBOthat was specified by the instructor. It is different than a move, whichmoves content one position at a time, yet it adheres to the same rulesand has much of the same processing.

Functional Processing

-   1. Verify that the CBO id passed is valid.-   2. Verity that the destination container id passed exists in the    CBO.-   3. Contents listed are relocated one at a time in the order    provided.-   4. Verity that the piece of content does exist in the CBO.-   5. For content containers (e.g. Chapter), add it after the container    specified.-   6. For content components (e.g. Section, UPM Section), add it to the    end of the container specified, before any back matter elements in    that container.    -   If a relocate causes the total virtual page count of the current        volume to go above or below the volume virtual page count limit,        the volumes are reorganized.-   7. Pricing and virtual page count calculations (described    subsequently) are performed for each relocate operation. The net    results are stored in the digital library via the    EAdminPopulatePageAndPrice function as attributes for the affected    Chapters, Volumes as well as the CBO totals.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Userid CBO id Content id listContent id count Container id Outputs New CBO description if OK;Offending content ids if error Errors RC_NOT_FOUND RC_INVALID_CBO

Index Classes

-   -   CustomBookOutline        EAdminPopulatePageAndPrice

Description

Calculate and update the pricing and virtual page count information ofeither an existing prepublished content product or a CBO. Forprepublished content products, this function is called at load time. ForCBO's, it is called every time a CBO is modified in a manner affects theCBO page count or price.

Functional Processing

-   I. Import content of the input filename, which is description of    either one existing prepublished content product or one CBO.-   II. Retrieve the program-specific attributes related to pricing and    virtual page count.-   III. Calculate and update the pricing and virtual page count    information for each level of entities in the prepublished content    product or CBO description.-   IV. Export the updated description as content of the output    filename.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Input filename Output filenameOutputs (Content of the output file named) Errors RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   Program    -   ProgramAux

In the present example, “General Netiquette” section 1.3 166 isrelocated to Chapter 4 by the ECBORelocateContent procedure, as shown inFIG. 17. Affected sections have been renumbered.

Deleting Content From a CBO

Content may be deleted from the custom book outline by checking theselect box next to the entity to be deleted and then clicking on the“Remove” button 172 on the vertical menu bar (see FIG. 16). This actioninvokes the ECBORemoveContent procedure, described below.

ECBORemoveContent

Description

This will remove content from an active CBO. It After the instructorselects sections/chapters in his active CBO, he may remove them from theCBO. It also will ensure that no content is removed that is aprerequisite to another. It will merge content back into a single volumeif possible.

Functional Processing

-   1. Verify that the CBO id passed is valid.-   2. Content comes in two categories, containers and non-containers.    Selected content must be either all containers or all content    components, but not a mixture of both.-   3. Contents listed are removed one at a time from the active CBO.-   4. Verify that the piece of content does exist in the CBO.-   5. Verify that the piece of content is not a pre-requisite of any    contents in the CBO, other than those being removed this time.-   6. Remove the piece of content from the CBO.-   7. If a remove causes the total virtual page count of the current    volume to go below the volume virtual page count limit, check    whether it is possible to move some or all its content elements to    the previous volume. If after the adjustment the current volume    becomes empty, the current volume is deleted. If subsequent removes    cause the total virtual page count of the current volume to go below    the volume virtual page count limit, further adjustments are made as    needed.-   8. Pricing and virtual page count calculations are performed for    each remove operation. The net results are stored as attributes for    the affected Chapter, Volumes as well as the CBO totals.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Userid CBO id Container flagContent id list Content id count Outpu New CBO description if OK; tsOffending content ids if error Errors RC_NOT_FOUND RC_PREREQ_ERRORRC_INVALID_CBO

Index Classes

-   -   CustomBookOutline

Certain entities can be protected from deletion. In the present example,these include automatically generated components such as the Table ofContents, Preface, and Index. They also include front and back matterassociated with the content sections inserted by the user. Consequently,these entities are not provided with select boxes.

A user may clear all contents of an active CBO by clicking on the “ClearBook” button 178. This action invokes a simplified version of theprevious function, which essentially selects all entities, includingfront and back matter, UPM's and titles, and removes them from the CBO.The actual implementation is a call to the ECBODelete function, followedby a call to the ECBOCreate function. The user is left with an empty CBOshell like that of FIG. 10A.

ECBODelete

Description

This function discards all contents of an active CBO.

Functional Processing

-   1. Verify that the CBO id passed is valid.-   2. Remove the CBO entirely from the datastore.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Userid CBO id Outputs ErrorsRC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   CustomBookOutline

Undoing Changes to CBO

With some exceptions, a user may undo the last change to the content ofhis active CBO. Referring to FIG. 17, this is accomplished by clickingon the “Undo Last” button, which invokes the ECBOUndo proceduredescribed below.

ECBOUndo

Description

This function undoes the last change to the content of the active CBO.Note that this is a single level undo capability.

For each CBO, two versions of the CBO content are maintained as separateparts in the digital library. As each CBO operation is performed, if theoperation will change the content of the CBO, the active version beforethe change is saved as the backup version. And the new active versionwill include the change. Later on when the undo operation is required,the backup version is restored into the active one.

Functional Processing

-   I. Verify that the CBO id passed is valid.-   II. Verify that the active version of the CBO is available.-   III. Verify that the backup version of the CBO is available.-   IV. Set the Undoable status to False in the backup version.-   V. Mark the backup version as the new active version of the CBO.-   VI. Remove the old obsolete active version of the CBO.-   VII. The following CBO operations can be undone:    -   A. ECBOAddContent    -   B. ECBONewContainer    -   C. ECBORemoveContent    -   D. ECBOMoveContent    -   E. ECBORelocateContent    -   F. ECBOSetTitle    -   G. ECBOSetState    -   H. ECBOSetTerms-   VIII. The following CBO operations cannot be undone:    -   A. ECBOCreate    -   B. ECBODelete    -   C. ECBOUndo    -   D. ECBOAddUPM    -   E. ECBOSubmit-   IX. The following CBO operations have no impact on the undoable    status since there was no change to the CBO:    -   A. ECBOGet    -   B. ECBOList    -   C. ECBOListByCreator    -   D. ECBOGetUPM

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Userid CBO id Outputs New CBOdescription Errors RC_CBO_NOT_UNDOABLE RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   CustomBookOutline    -   Editing an Existing CBO

Returning users may already have CBO's stored in the digital library 20that were created in previous sessions. Thus at logon, the logonprocedure invokes the ECBOListByCreator procedure, which issues a queryto the digital library 20 to find any CBO entries in which theE_CreatorID column matches the userid. The ECBOListByCreator function isdescribed below.

ECBOListByCreator

Description

This will return a list of CBO's created by a particular user within aProgram ID.

Functional Processing

-   1. Verify that program id passed is valid.-   2. Search for CBO's with the program id and the creator id    specified.-   3. For each CBO found, output the CBO id, Type, Title, Creator id,    Modification timestamp, and CBO status.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Program id Creator id OutputsCBO id list Errors RC_INVALID_OR_MISSING_INPUT RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   CustomBookOutline    -   Program

FIG. 9B is an example of a welcome screen that may be presented to areturning user by the ECBO ListByCreator procedure. The Custom BookOutlines section 113 lists CBO's that the user created in previoussessions.

The user now has three options. He may 1) select an active CBO formodification by clicking on its title, 2) “CLONE” and modify an existingCBO by clicking on the CBO's corresponding CLONE button 116, or 3)create a new CBO by clicking on button 118

To modify an existing CBO, the user clicks on its title. This actioninvokes the EDIT procedure, which retrieves the corresponding CBO andassociated parts from digital library 20 (but not the actual content).The CBO is parsed and displayed to the user in the same formatpreviously described with reference to editing a new CBO. In this case,however, there will already be entities present in the outline. The usermay now add, move, or delete content as previously described.

The user may wish to create a new version of a CBO while preserving theoriginal CBO. This can be achieved by invoking a “CLONE” function. Inbrief, the “CLONE” function makes a duplicate copy of an existing CBOwhich the user may then modify as desired. The user merely clicks on the“CLONE” button 116 corresponding to the CBO to be copied. This actioninvokes the ECBOClone procedure described below.

ECBOClone

Description

This function will copy an existing CBO to a new CBO for a user. Itcopies all UPM and pre-published material contained within the CBO.Users clone CBO's when then they.

-   I. Click on the Clone button within the Login page-   II. Click on the Clone button within the MyBookOutline page

Functional Processing

-   I. Copy the existing CBO to a new CBO with users userid and title    specified.-   II. Mark the new CBO's status as Working (CBO Status=“1”).-   III. Extract the Program variables related to pricing and virtual    page count, storing them in the CBO. The estimated page count and    prices from the original CBO are kept on the new CBO.-   IV. Writes the CBO to the digital library

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Program id Userid Existing CBOid New CBO Title Outputs New CBO id Errors RC_INVALID_OR_MISSING_INP UTRC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   CustomBookOutline    -   Program    -   ProgramAux

Viewing a CBO

When the user has completed creating his custom book outline, he mayview its contents by clicking on “Submit Request” button 180 on thevertical menu bar (see FIG. 16). This action invokes View procedure inapplication layer 28. Briefly, the view procedure displays the custombook in a manner as shown in FIG. 18, i.e., in a table of contentsformat wherein the section titles are hypertext links 190 to filescontaining the actual section content files retrieved. By clicking onany section title, the user invokes the EGetHTML procedure. In brief,the EGetHTML procedure retrieves the part containing the SGML contentsof the selected section and passes them to an SGML to HTML converter. Anexample of an SGML to HTML converter suitable for use according to thepresent embodiment is the publicly available Omnimark Konstructor. TheSGML to HTML converter performs the conversion using a data typedictionary, which defines the SGML content. The EGetHTML procedure isdescribed in more detail below.

EGetHTML

Description

This function retrieves the SGML content for a particular sequence idand then passes the content blob to an SGML to HTML converter (e.g.,Konstructor). Search words are also passed so that the converter canhighlight found words. It communicates over a TCP socket to Konstructor.

The low resolution associated components for all sections are stored onthe front-end web server for fast retrieval on presentation. Therefore,the content does not have to make a digital library call for each image,speeding up retrieval.

Functional Processing

-   I. Construct the header that contains tags for the sequence id,    title hit words and index hit words.-   II. Search for a product entity with the sequence id passed.-   II. Retrieve the SGML part of this entity.-   IV. Connect to the Konstructor server using the SGML hostname/IP    address and port number passed.-   V. Send the header information that contains tags for the sequence    id, title hit words and index hit words.-   VI. Send the SGML data for translation.-   VII. Receive from the Konstructor server the HTML blob resulted from    the translation.-   VIII. Disconnect from the Konstructor server.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Userid SGML hostname or IPaddress SGML port number Sequence id Title hit words Index hit wordsOutputs HTML blob Errors RC_SYSTEM_ERROR −1

Index Classes

-   -   Product

4. Page and Price Calculation

The Page and Price calculations are performed by EProductGetOutline andthe CBO routines using a set of algorithms against data that is storedin the digital library in both the Program and Section entities. Thisestimated page count and price can be overridden with actual page countsfrom the original pre-published sections by system administrators.

Inputs

CBO UPMBYTES Derived number of bytes of UPM in the CBO E_ProgramAvgChrPerImage Average characters per image AvgChrPerSGMLAC Averagecharacters per SGML Associated Component MaxChrPerUpmTier Number ofcharacters in an UPM pricing block E_ProgramAux PE_Base_Cust_Pub_PriceBase price to be added to every custom publication PE_Base_UPM_Fee Baseprice to be added whenever UPM is included PE_Incr_UPM_Fee Additionalprice for each UPM pricing block PE_Source_Price_Per_Page Price per pagefor pre-published content included PE_UPM_Bytes_Per_Page Number of UPMcharacters in a page PE_Minimum_Page_Limit The minimum number of pagesrequired in a custom publ. PE_Volume_Page_Limit The maximum number ofpages in a volume PE_AC_Form_ID The associated component type defined inPE_AC_ByteCount Number of “characters” for that associated componenttype E_Product Image_Type Type of image, as defined in Image_Type Numberof non-markup characters in content AC_ImageCount Number of associatedcomponent images in content ACSubdocCount Number of SGML subdocuments incontent PageCount Actual page count of content E_ProductAuxAC_Counts.ACFORMID The associated component type defined inAC_Counts.NUMBERAC The number for each associated component typeUse_Actuals Switch to determine if content actual page count is usedOutputs

None.

It is desirable to construct a page and price calculator for the purposeof estimating page and pricing information for a CBO. The following pageand price calculator described below was devised for this purpose. Eachtime the ECBOGet function is called to retrieve a CBO for displaying,the Page and Price calculation routines are run for the CBO.

Actual Page and Price calculations occur several times throughout thelife of a CBO, e.g., Page and Price calculations for Chapters, Volumesand the entire CBO occur any time there is an operation performed onthat CBO which includes adding, moving, or deleting content. For pricingconsistency the Page and Price calculation for a pre-published sectionin the present embodiment occurs one and only one time for the entirelife of that content inside the CBO. However, it will be understood thata system designer can alternatively decide to permit changes toprepublished sections if desired.

The price of a CBO is dependent on the page count. Therefore, the pagecount is calculated first. According to the present embodiment, theChapter Page Count calculation is the aggregation of the Section and UPMPage Counts for any content that exists in that chapter. The ChapterPrice calculation is the aggregation of only the Section Prices for anysections that exist in that chapter. Calculation of the Pages forvolumes is the aggregation of the Chapter and UPM Page Counts for allchapters in that volume and UPM that exist as a direct child of thatVolume. The Volume Price calculation is the aggregation of only theChapter Prices for any Chapters that exist in that volume. Calculationof the Page Counts for the entire CBO is the aggregation of all of theVolume Page Counts. Price calculations for the CBO are done with theVolume Page Counts, Total UPM Page Count, Volume Prices, and thespecific program variables as inputs into the CBO price calculationformula. This embodiment implies the following page count calculationorder:

-   1. Section/UPM Page Count-   2. Chapter/UPM Page Count-   3. Volume Page Count-   4. Book Page Count

A section's page counts are estimated based upon the number of non-tagcharacters in the content, plus the number and type of associatedcomponents (AC). AC's are graphics appearing in the section and cannotexist outside of the section. In an effort to make the page estimatingprocess more accurate, AC's are broken up into five different categoriesbased on size. The categories below are differentiated and their valuesstored in the ProgramAux index class and their values stored inPE_AC_ByteCount. The E_ProductAux index class will then contain matchingACFORMIDs and NUMBERAC values to use in the calculation. Page countswill be rounded to the nearest tenth of a page.

1Associated Component Categories 1 Inline Graphic 2 Display Graphic 3Inline Equation 4 Display Equation 5 SGML

In some cases, the automated page/price calculator does not prove to beaccurate to the original pre-published material's figures. Therefore, aUse_Actuals option is provided within the calculator. This optionprovides the system administrator with the capability to override acalculated value for the page and/or price values for a pre-publishedcontent. This Use_Actuals capability forms the beginning of thecalculator process.

Page and Price Count Calculator Process

-   1. When Use_Actuals is “1” and PageCount has a value, then use    PageCount-   2. When Use_Actuals is “0” or PageCount has no value, then use the    calculation below.    -   a) First, calculate the number of “characters” in the content,        using textual SGML, images, graphics, and subdocument SGML.        These values are preferably calculated by Converter 10 and are        loaded by the Eloader program. The calculator then multiplies        the number of each category of associated component by the        average byte count for each category and then adds the number of        source characters (Char_Count) in the SGML. Char_Count is stored        within the Product Index Class.        Characters=(E_Char_Count+Σ^(1−n (NumberAC×PE) ^(—) ^(AC) ^(—)        ^(ByteCount))

Equation 2. Characters Per Page Calculation

-   -   b) Second, divide the number of “characters” by the average        number of “characters” per page (AvgCharPerPage) to get the        estimated page count. The AvgCharPerPage variable is stored        within the Program index class and placed within the CBO at CBO        create time.        Pages=Characters/E_AvgChrPerPage

Equation 3. Estimated Pre-published Pages Calculation

3. Calculate the UPM Estimated Page Count by dividing the number of UPMcharacters (UPMBytes) by the number of UPM characters per page(PE_UPM_Bytes_Per_Page). The UPMBytes is the UPM file size and iscomputed when the UPM is added to the CBO and stored into the CBO. ThePE_UPM_Bytes_Per_Page variable is stored within the E_ProgramAux indexclass and placed within the CBO at CBO create time.UPM Page Count=UPMBytes/PE_UPM_Bytes_Per_Page

Equation 4. UPM Page Count Calculation

Once the page count is computed, the pricing information can be derived.Pre-published content pricing is determined by first multiplying theestimated page count with the price per page value.Estimated Price=Pages×PE_Source_Price_Per_Page

Equation 5. Estimated Base Price Calculation

Note that UPM pricing is calculated at the CBO level. Therefore, theprice for an UPM Section is never calculated. However, the UPM SectionPage Counts are calculated every time the CBO Page and Prices arecalculated.

Next, the UPM cost is calculated and added to make a total publicationcost. The UPM calculation is based on a base charge for all bookscontaining UPM content. This base charge is the minimum cost added to abook containing UPM.

If a CBO contains UPM then the UPM estimated page count (UPM_Page_Count)is used to select the equation to be used. When the UPM Page Count isgreater than the UPM Base Size (PE_Chars_Per_UPM_Tier) perform thecalculation in Equation 5. Otherwise, use the calculation in Equation 6.PE_Chars_Per_UPM_Tier is stored within the Program Index Class andstored within the CBO at creation time.

Use the greater of the minimum CBO cost (PE_Min_Order_Price) and the CBOEstimated Price.If UPMBytes>0, then UPM_Base_Charge=PE_Base_UPM_Fee; otherwiseUPM_Base_Charge=0;CBO Estimated Price=PE_Base_Cust_Pub_Price+Σ^(1−n) ((Pages)×PE_Source_Price_Per_Page+PE_Base_(UPM)_Fee+((UPMBytes−PE_Chars_Per—UPM_Tier)/PE_UPM_Bytes_Per_Page)×PE Incr_UPM−^(Fee)Equation 6. Estimated Price Calculation with UPM Greater than BaseIf UPMBytes>0, then UPM_Base_Charge=PE_Base_UPM_Fee; otherwiseUPM_Base_Charge=0;CBO Estimated Price=PE_Base_Cust_Pub_Price+Σ^(1−n) (Pages)+PE—Base_UPM_FeeEquation 67. Estimated Price Calculation with UPM Less than Base

EXAMPLE

The Page and Price count example consists of a Custom Book Outline (CBO)entitled Student Loans. Referring to FIG. 19, two pre-published sections201, 202 are added to the CBO resulting in the HTML table of contentsview shown.

In the above example, the ECBOGet function was called at the conclusionof adding the two pre-published sections (ECBOAddContent). The CBOcalculations are shown below.Section 1.1 Characters=(40+(2×50)+(3×10))=170Section 1.1 Pages=170/290=0.0586=0.06 rounded  (203)Section 1.1 Estimated Price=0.586×10=0.0586=0.06 rounded  (204)Section 1.2 Characters=(70+(3×50)+(7×10))=290Section 1.2 Pages=290/290=1.0  (205)Section 1.2 Estimated Prices 1.0×0.10=0.1  (206)

After calculating the newly added section page and prices, the chapter'spage and price calculations can be performed. This consists of thesummation of it's contents. For chapter one the calculation is:Chapter 1 Pages 0.6+1.0=1.6Chapter 1 Estimated Price=0.06+0.1=0.16

Next, the volume page and price is calculated by summing the chaptervalues and adding the cost associated with the front matter and backmatter (i.e. index). In this case, volume 1 contains only onechapter, 1. The page and price counts for the volume are shown below. Itassumes the page and costs of the front and back matter are: 15 and 5respectively.Volume 1 Pages=1.6+15+5=21.6  (207)Volume 1 Estimated Price=0.16+1.5+0.5=2.16  (208)

Lastly, the book's values are calculated by summing all the volumevalues. In this case, there is only one volume. The book's values aretherefore the same as the Volume 1 page count and estimated price.

5. Volume Boundaries Determination

One of the inherent properties of a CBO is a maximum number of pagesallowed to exist in a Volume. This volume page count limitation isretrieved from the ProgramAux index class and stored into the CBO whenit is created. It is that value, stored in the CBO, that is used todefine the volume boundaries for the life of that CBO. Severaloperations that the user can perform, including moving, relocating,adding, and deleting content, will create a need for the volume pagecounts for that CBO to be examined. Alterations to the layout of thevolumes to accommodate Page Limits will occur automatically by thisroutine with the following conditions:

-   -   1) All changes to volumes are done with a move up or move down.    -   2) Added/Updated UPM can never have a higher page count than the        Volume Page Limit    -   3) Added/Updated Chapters can never have a higher page count        than the Volume Page Limit    -   4) If a Chapter is moved from one Volume to another, the Chapter        is moved in its entirety. No “Chapter Splitting” is permitted.    -   5) After content is moved from one volume to another, the        sequential order of content in the table of contents for the CBO        should be exactly as before the move occurred.    -   6) A new volume is created if a volume page limit is exceeded        and there are no volumes below that volume in which to move the        exceeding content.    -   7) Content can be moved up if there is enough space created in a        preceding volume to fit the first piece of content from the next        volume.    -   8) If a volume no longer contains any content, it is removed.        ReorganizeCBO Routine

The reorganizeCBO routine is an internal function not defined in the APIlayer. It is used by other public functions (i.e. ECBOAddUPM, etc.) tofacilitate volume management. This routine is responsible for managingthe volume page limits of a CBO. This routine accomplishes this task inthe following steps:

-   -   1) Retrieve this CBO's volume page limit from inside the CBO    -   2) For each volume in the CBO do the following:        -   a) Calculate the number of pages in a volume X        -   b) If the number of pages in volume X is greater than the            limit            -   i) Find the last piece of content in volume X            -   ii) Make sure the size of the last piece of content is                less than the Volume Page Limit            -   iii) Get the next volume, X+1, in the system, or create                a new one if there isn't one            -   iv) Place the last piece of content at the head of                volume, X+1            -   v) recalculate the page counts for volume X and X+1            -   vi) Re-call (a.k.a. recursion) the reorganizeCBO routine                from the beginning to see if moving the last piece of                content from volume X+1 to volume X has balanced                everything out.        -   a) Check to see if volume X−1 has enough space to move the            first piece of content from volume X up into volume X−1. If            volume X−1 does not exist, this step and substeps are            skipped.            -   i) Place the first piece of content from volume X at the                end of volume X−1            -   ii) Recalculate the page counts for both volume X−1 and                X            -   iii) Re-call (a.k.a. recursion) the reorganizeCBO                routine from the beginning to see if moving the first                piece of content up a volume has balanced everything                out.        -   a) Check to see if the volume X is empty. If so, it can be            deleted.        -   b) Recalculate the page and prices for the entire CBO and            then go back to step a) using the next volume in the CBO.            When all volumes make it through step e) the CBO is balanced            and the pages and prices for the CBO have been recalculated            and the routine is finished.

Referring to FIG. 20A, suppose we have a CBO entitled, Engineering, andthe volume page limit is 45 pages. This is a rather small volume pagelimit, but it is suitable for this example. This CBO contains onechapter 221 entitled, Professionalism and Codes of Ethics. The pagecount 222 for this CBO is 36.6 pages. It remains under the 45 pages pervolume limit therefore only one volume 223 exists.

Referring now to FIG. 20B, assume that we want to add a second chapter224, Understanding Ethical Problems, consisting of 11.9 pages. Since36.6 (chapter 1 page count including volume front and back matter)+11.9(chapter two page count) is greater than 45, a new volume 225 must becreated to hold this second chapter. This new volume 225 contains frontmatter and back matter 154 of its own. This additional front and backmatter 154 results in a larger final page count 226 of 68.5 for bothvolumes.

Suppose we would like to move Chapter 2, section 2.1 227 entitled“Introduction” into Chapter 1. This can be done because section 2.1contains only 0.3 pages and there are over 4 pages of extra room left involume 1. The results of this move are shown in FIG. 20C.

6. Prerequisite Checking

One of the tasks performed during the process of adding and deletingcontent involves validation of prerequisite pre-published content.Prerequisite content is some pre-published material, B, that is requiredwithin a CBO when a piece of material, A, is included in the CBO. Thelocation of B and A within the CBO is the responsibility of the add anddelete routines. The focus of this discussion is to determine therequired content for a piece of material, A.

The Business Problem

Often times within the publishing industry, a piece of content requiresother content to be included. For example, a section discussing Calculusintegration requires a section outlining the integration homeworkproblems. The Calculus integration section is known as the requiringsection and the homework problems is the section being required. It isimportant to note prerequisite content is only definable at the sectionlevel and therefore precludes chapters and volumes from beingprerequisite material. These required sections are most easilyunderstood in the form of business rules.

The table below shows six prerequisite business rules. The “RequiringResource” column defines the resource requiring prerequisite material.The “Required Resource List” column defines the prerequisite materialrequired. The term “Case” is equivalent to a Section, i.e., both areleaf nodes in the hierarchical model. The “Requirement Type” column isthe type of the requirement. It can be either “one” or “all”. If it is“one”, then only one of the required resources needs to be placed intothe CBO. If the CBO, contains none of the required resources then thefist required resource in the list is included. In the event that thetype requirement is “all”, all required resources must be placed intothe CBO.

The “Program Restriction” column defines the program restriction type.This column coupled with the “Programs to Include or Exclude” columndefines the program context of the prerequisite material. The value ofthis column can be either “include” or “exclude”. If it is “include”,then the requiring rule only applies to those programs listed in the“Programs to Include or Exclude” column. If it is “exclude”, then therequiring rule only applies to those programs not listed in the“Programs to Include or Exclude” column. “All” specifies all programsrather than having to explicitly define each one.

The “Temporal Restriction”, “Effective Start Date” and “EffectiveTermination Date” columns define a time context for the requiring rule.A time context states for the rule to either apply only during aspecified time period or not to apply at all during the specific timeperiod. The “Effective Start Date” and “Effective Termination Date”columns define the start and terminate dates for a rule. The “TemporalRestriction” column can contain two values: “includes” and “excludes”.If the value is “includes”, the rule is to be applied only during thetime period outlined by the “Effective Start Date” and “EffectiveTermination Date” columns. If the value is “excludes”, the rule is notto be applied during the time period outlined in these columns.

Program Temporal Requirement Restriction Programs to RestrictionEffective Effective Requiring Type Required Includes or Include orIncludes or Start Termination Resource (all or one) Resource ListExcludes Exclude Excludes Date Date Section 3 ALL Section 2 N/A N/A N/AN/A N/A Case D* ONE Case B, Case C N/A All N/A N/A N/A Section 4 ALLSection 3 N/A All Includes May 1998 May 1999 Section 3 ALL Section 2 N/AAll Excludes May 1999 September 1999 Case D* ONE Case B, ExcludesBusiness and Excludes May 1999 September Case C Economics 1999 Case B*ALL Case A Includes MIS N/A N/A N/A

In the business rule represented by row 1, the requiring resource isSection 3 of a prepublished book and requires section two. Since the“Program Restriction” and “Programs to Include or Exclude” columns aremarked “N/A”, this rule is to be applied to all programs. In addition,it is to be applied all the time since no start and end dates arespecified. The business rule in row 4 also pertains to Section 3. Therules of rows 1 and four are similar with the exception of theapplicable time period. In this situation, section 2 is included priorto May 1999 and after September 1999. Thus, rules can be combined toform more complicated rules relationships.

A Solution

To apply the above rules to the system of the present invention, a fewassumptions have been made. First, it is assumed the data modelpreviously defined for pre-published content cannot be alteredsignificantly to incorporate these changes. Second, when a piece ofcontent is added or deleted, it is assumed the corresponding functionhandles the location of the material within the CBO. Third, it isassumed this solution must only define the applicable business rules fordefining prerequisite material.

A challenge posed by the business rules shown above is in the area ofprogram and time period exclusions. This is due to the fact exclusionand inclusion rules can often conflict with one another. In the presentembodiment, the defining of rules has been limited to “positive” rulesto reduce the possibility of exclusion time periods. In other words, inthe example described previously regarding section 3 requiring section2, the 1^(st) and 4^(th) rules can be replaced with the following tworules.

Requirement Required Program Temporal Effective Effective Requiring TypeResource Restriction Programs to Restriction Start Termination Resource(all or one) List Includes Include Includes Date Date Section 3 ALLSection 2 N/A N/A Includes September May 1999 1977 Section 3 ALL Section2 N/A N/A Includes May 1999 September 1999

In an effort to reduce the possibility for conflicting rules, thenegative or exclusive rules have been replaced with positive rules. Inaddition, the required resource list is only permitted to have onesection per rule (row). This implies that the requirement type is alwaysone and can therefore be eliminated from the grid. Similar to theresource column, the “Programs to Include” column is only permitted tohave one program per rule (row). Lastly, it is assumed the program isexplicitly stated. The grid below shows a simplified grid as a result ofmaking these assumptions.

Effective Requiring Required Program to Effective Start TerminationResource Resource Include Date Date Section 3 Section 2 BusinessSeptember 1977 May 1999 Economics Section 3 Section 2 Business September1999 September Economics 2099

The following grid shows another example involving the two rules (rows 2and 5) for Case D defined in the first table. The 5^(th) rule has beenconverted into four rules (rows 1-4, below) and the 2^(nd) rule has beenconverted into two rules (rows 5 and 6, below).

Effective Effective Requiring Required Start Termination ResourceResource Program to Include Date Date Case D Case B Business EconomicsN/A N/A Case D Case C Business Economics N/A N/A Case D Case B BusinessEconomics September May 1999 1997 Case D Case B Business EconomicsSeptember September 1999 2099 Case D Case C Business Economics SeptemberMay 1999 1997 Case D Case C Business Economics September September 19992099

A rule collision exists in the preceding table for the program businesseconomics between the dates of May 1999 and September 1999. During thistime, rules 3-6 do not apply. However, rules 1 and 2 do apply since theydo not have a defined start and termination time period. The result isthat Cases B and C are prerequisites at all times (even between May 1999and September 1999). Prior to May 1999, rules 3 and 4 are exercised.Between May 1999 and September 1999, rules 1 and 2 are exercised andafter September 1999 rules 5 and 6 are used. The effect desired is forno rules to be exercised between May 1999 and September 1999. This canbe accomplished by removing rules 1 and 2. At the present time, thisproblem has a low likelihood of occurring and is thus left to the systemadministrator to manage. The system administrator is informed this is anerroneous situation and is requested to remove rules 1 and 2.

The prerequisite content is defined at the time a pre-published book isloaded. An editor identifies the prerequisite content for apre-published book and defined it in the format defined in the gridbelow. This format is placed into a PSF/ATR file and loaded into DLusing the same facility that loaded the pre-published books, batch loadfacility.

BNF Grammar Construct Value <prereq content> <relation> <relation>RELATION: <sequence id> [ <prereq attr group> ]+ <prereq attr group>!PREREQ !KIND: <kind> !PROGRAM: <program id> !REQUIREDID: <sequence id>!STARTDATE: <date> !ENDDATE: <date> !DESCRIPTION: <description> <kind>Requires <program id> A 2 letter string <sequence id>XXXXXXXXXX.CC.SS.00 where X is the ISBN number; C is the chapter number;S is the section number. <date> mm/dd/yy where mm is the month; dd isthe day and yy is the year. <description> A text description to the endof line

Suppose Section 3's ISBN number is 0234567891.01.03.00 and Section 2'sISBN number is 0343434343.02.02.00. The following grid defines twosample rules. The following PSF/ATR file format represents these tworules.

Effective Effective Requiring Required Start Termination ResourceResource Program to Include Date Date Section 3 Section 2 BusinessEconomics September May 1999 1977 Section 3 Section 2 Business EconomicsSeptember September 1999 2099

RELATION: 0234567891.01.03.00 !PREREQ !KIND: Requires !PROGRAM: FE!REQUIREDID: 0343434343.02.02.00 !STARTDATE: 09/01/1977 !ENDDATE:05/01/1999 !DESCRIPTION: Rule One !PREREQ !KIND: Requires !PROGRAM: FE!REQUIREDID: 0343434343.02.02.00 !STARTDATE: 09/01/1999 !ENDDATE:09/01/2099 !DESCRIPTION: Rule Two

A group of configuration files are used in defining the DL data model toPSF/ATR file format mappings. In the case of prerequisite information,the DL data model consists of the following two index classes. The indexclass attribute to PSF/ATR file mappings are also provided.

Prereq Index Class

SeqID Seq_ID Ext..Alpha [32] INDEXED EntityType PSF Ext..Alpha [32]ParentItem Program generated Ext..Alpha [16] SiblingItem Programgenerated Ext..Alpha [16] ChildItem Program generated Ext..Alpha [16]AuxItem Program generated Ext..Alpha [16] SubcompItem Program generatedExt..Alpha [16] ProgramID PE_ID Alpha[4] AC_PE_ID

PrereqAux Index Class

SeqID PSF Ext. Alpha [32] PrereqItem Program generated Ext. Alpha [16]ParentItem Program generated Ext. Alpha [16] SiblingItem Programgenerated Ext. Alpha [16] ChildItem Program generated Ext. Alpha [16]Keyword Relation Alpha [32] Kind RequiredID StartDate EndDateDescription Value ATR file Ext. Alpha [254] NextValueItem Programgenerated Ext. Alpha [16]

Once the data is loaded into these index classes, it can be queried bythe add and delete functions. Each time the add and delete functionsneed to determine the applicable rules, a query is made to the PreReqindex class. A sample query which searches for those rules applicable toa section, 0562423452.03.02.00, is shown below.

-   -   EntityType==RELATION    -   Kind==‘Requires’ AND    -   Program==‘FE’ AND    -   Seq_ID==‘0562423452.03.02.00’ AND    -   StartDate <=‘today's date’ AND    -   EndDate >=‘today's date’

The results from the query are the list of required sequence identifiersfor the specified requiring sequence identifier. With the list ofrequiring ids identified, the add, and delete operations can manipulatethe sections appropriately.

7. Rights Management (Mutual Exclusiveness)

One of the tasks performed during the process of adding content involvesvalidation of rights managment. Rights management consists of performingmutual exclusive checks on content prior to adding it to a CBO. Mutualexclusive content is some pre-published material, B, that is notpermitted in the same publication as some piece of material, A. Thelocation of B and A within the CBO is the responsibility of the addroutine. The focus of this discussion is to determine the mutuallyexclusive content for a piece of material, A.

The Business Problem

At times within the publishing industry, a piece of content is notpermitted to appear in the same publication as another piece of content.For example, two authors, Joe and Sarah, have a dislike for one anotherand have stated they do not allow their works to be published together.To prevent this situation, a check is performed when addingpre-published content authored by Joe to a CBO to make sure the CBO doesnot already contain pre-published content by Sarah.

The described problem requires business rules for pre-published contentto be defined in the datastore. These business rules are in the form of:content A cannot exist with content B. Due to the term “cannot” in thesebusiness rules, the rules are considered negative business rules. Thisis in contrast to prerequisite checking, where positive business rulesof pre-published content inclusion applied. In the event one of thenegative business rules are true, the pre-published content is not addedto the CBO.

Each negative business rule consists of two pieces of information: thepre-published content, A, being added and the pre-published content, B,not permitted to exist with A. One or more negative business rules canbe defined for a pie-published content A having different pre-publishedcontent B specified.

The following grid illustrates two negative business rules. In the firstrule, pre-published content, A, is not permitted to be added to a CBOcontaining pre-published content, B. In the second rule, pre-publishedcontent, A, is not permitted to be added to a CBO containingpre-published content, C.

Prepublished Content Not Permitted Prepublished Content to be Added toExist Within CBO A B A CA Solution

To apply the above negative rules to the system of the presentinvention, a few assumptions have been made. First, it is assumed thedata model previously defined for pre-published content cannot bealtered significantly to incorporate these changes. Second, when a pieceof content is added, it is assumed the corresponding function handlesthe location of the material within the CBO. Third, it is assumed thatthis solution must only define the applicable business rules fordefining mutually exclusive material.

Unlike the pre-requisite material, mutually exclusive material does nothave a time period associated with it. A mutually exclusive rule isassumed to be in effect at all times. Since no time period is definedfor the rules, contradictory rules cannot exist. Thus the data modelrepresenting these rules is simpler than that for pre-requisite materialrules.

The mutually exclusive content is defined at the time a pie-publishedbook is loaded. An editor identifies the mutually exclusive content fora pre-published book and defines it in the format defined in the gridbelow. This format is placed into a PSF/ATR file and loaded into DLusing the same facility that loaded the pre-published books, i.e., theloader 14 batch load facility.

BNF Grammar Construct Value <mutually exclusive <relation> content>RELATION: <sequence id> [ <prereq attr group> ]+ <prereq attr group>!EXCLUSION !PROGRAM: <program id> !EXCLUDEID: <sequence id>!DESCRIPTION: <description> <program id> A 2 letter string <sequence id>XXXXXXXXXX.CC.SS.00 where X is the ISBN number; C is the chapter number;S is the section number. <description> A text description to the end ofline

Suppose a Section 3 has an ISBN number is 0234567891.01.03.00 and aSection 2 has an ISBN number is 0343434343.02.02.00. Both sections havebeen selected for addition to a CBO. The following grid defines twosample rules. The first rule states to not permit pre-published content,Section 3, to be added to a CBO containing pre-published content,Section 2, for a program, Business Economics. The second rule states tonot permit pre-published content, Section 2A, to be added to a CBOcontaining Section 3C, for the program, Freshmen Engineering.

Prepublished Mutually Exclusive Content to Add Pre-Published ContentProgram to Include Section 3 Section 2 Business Economics Section 2Section 3 Freshmen EngineeringThe following PSF/ATR file format represents these two rules.

RELATION: 0234567891.01.03.00 !EXCLUSION !PROGRAM: BE !EXCLUDEID:0343434343.02.02.00 !DESCRIPTION: Rule One RELATION: 0343434343.02.02.00!EXCLUSION !PROGRAM: FE !EXCLUDEID: 0234567891.01.03.00 !DESCRIPTION:Rule Two

Assuming only the preceding two rules exist in a system, adding Section2 to a CBO containing Section 3 within the Business Economics programwould be permitted, contrary to the intended result. The followingreciprocal rule can be generated to eliminate this situation.

Prepublished Content to Mutually Exclusive Add Pre-Published ContentProgram to Include Section 2 Section 3 Business Economics

Therefore, each rule excludes a section of material, A, from being addedto a CBO containing another section of material, B. If it is desired tohave material A exclude material B and material B exclude material Athen two business rules are necessary. One rule for each exclusion.

As previously described, group of configuration files are used indefining the digital library 20 data model to PSF/ATR file formatmappings. In the case of rights management information, the data modelconsists of the following two index classes. The index class attributeto PSF/ATR file mappings are also provided.

Rights Index Class

SeqID Seq_ID Ext..Alpha [32] INDEXED AuxItem Program generatedExt..Alpha [16] ProgramID PE_ID Alpha [4] AC_PE_ID

RightsAux Index Class

SeqID PSF Ext. Alpha [32] RightsItem Program generated Ext. Alpha [16]SiblingItem Program generated Ext. Alpha [16] ChildItem Programgenerated Ext. Alpha [16] Keyword Relation Alpha [32] Description ValueATR file Ext. Alpha [254]

For each relation defined in the PSF files, a row is added to the Rightsindex class. For each exclusion within the relation, a row is added tothe Rights_Aux index class. All the exclusions for a relation areordered prior to loading into these index classes. The unique identifierof the first exclusion's row is placed into the AuxItem column of therelation's AuxItem column within the Rights index class. The SiblingItemcolumn of each exclusion contains the unique identifier of the nextexclusion within a relation. The last exclusion for a relation containsnothing in the SiblingItem field. Once the data is loaded into theseindex classes, it can be queried by the add function. Each time the addfunction needs to determine the applicable rules, a query is made to theRights index class. A sample query which searches for those rulesapplicable to a section, 0562423452.03.02.00, is shown below.

-   -   EntityType==RELATION    -   ProgramID==‘FE’ AND    -   Seq_ID==‘0562423452.03.02.00’    -   Return the AuxItem column

The results from the query are the values within the AuxItem column thatare required sequence identifiers for the specified excluded sequenceidentifier. The Rights Aux index class can be further queried todetermine those sequenced ids of the excluded material. With the list ofexclusion's ids identified, add operations can manipulate the sectionsappropriately.

8. Searching for Content

As mentioned previously, there are two methods for selecting content toinclude in a custom book outline. The first is to select content from abookshelf. The second is to search the content by querying the digitallibrary 20 based on user-provided search terms. Referring back to FIGS.3 and 6, the search capability is defined by the search support 52 inthe underlying digital library 20.

In the present example, the IBM Digital Library includes a parametricsearch capability for searching attributes defined in the data model,and a text searching capability (through the IBM Intelligent Miner forText) for searching the content itself. It will be understood that nosearch capability is required for the present system to be functional.Other types of search capability may be provided in addition to, or inplace of the search capability described. For example, the IBM DigitalLibrary is also able to provide legacy searching capability, searchgateways, and Query by Image Content.

The search capabilities present are made available to the user throughan EQuery application in API Layer 30 communicating with the digitallibrary 20. The EQuery API and application layers provide the ability toperform hierarchical searches against digital library, which is anon-hierarchical data store. This is achieved by the way the data isstored in the entity groups: primary/auxiliary. All hierarchical levelsof a pre-pub book are stored within the same digital library indexclass. Therefore, one or more simple digital library/Intelligent Minerfor Text queries on these primary/auxiliary index classes are all thatare needed to perform hierarchical searches.

An interesting challenge still remains—merging the results of individualqueries performed on different hierarchical levels. This problem isaddressed using “hit masks”, and will be discussed in more detailsubsequently.

EQuery as implemented in the present embodiment includes two formalinterfaces: One is internal and available directly as a native languagefunction call, i.e., a Search function residing in application layer 28.The other is external and available via the command line and is usedprimarily for testing and diagnostics. The native language call usesmemory buffers for the input search criteria and output search results.The command line version uses files for the input search criteria andoutput search results. Both interfaces use the same search criteriaformat and search results format according to the following rules:

Search Criteria Specification

General Rules

-   1. Every line is terminated by a newline charater.-   2. Each line that begins with a semicolon in the first column will    be ignored. It may be used to start some comments.-   3. Search Criteria structure consists of one or more Individual    Queries.-   4. The results of all the Individual Queries will be merged by    entities to form one single Search Results structure.

Individual Query Rules

-   1. Each line that begins in the first column (assuming not a    semicolon) is the beginning of a new Individual Query.-   2. The scope ENTITY indicates that the query scope will be the    particular entity type specified by the Search Level. Only those    entity types listed in the group attribute files (*.atr files) are    valid.-   2. The scope GROUP indicates that the query scope will be all the    entity types within one particular data model group specified by the    Search Level. Only those data model groups listed in the groups file    are valid.-   3. The Return Attribute List is a list of attributes to be returned    for each hit. The list is optional. If the list is left out, only    Entity Type and Sequence-ID for each hit will be returned. Only    those attributes of type ENTITY or type SYS are supported in the    Return Attribute List. If an attribute specified is not found or its    attribute value is NULL for a particular hit, the attribute is    simply ignored with no errors.-   4. The body of an Individual Query may contain one Text Search    Expression, or one Parametric Expression, or one Text Search    Expression followed by one Parametric Expression.

Text Search Expression Rules

-   1. A line that begins with exactly one tab followed by TEXT=is the    beginning of a Text Search Section.-   2. The Text Attribute following TEXT=indicates indirectly which text    index in TextMiner to query on. Only those attribute defined to be    associated with a text index are valid.-   3. The body of a Text Search Section may contain one Free Text term,    or one Text Search Expression, or one Free Text term followed by one    Text Search Expression.-   4. The valid Boolean Operators are AND (set intersection) and OR    (set union).-   5. The valid Text Search Types are EQ (contained in document), NE    (not contained in document), H (is in document), NI (is not in    document).-   6. Since the text index type chosen, Ngram, does not support Free    Text, the Free Text term is provided only for backward compatibility    purpose. The Free Text search string is always converted internally    to multiple search words grouped by OR.-   7. A line may not have more than one additional tab from the    previous line, if the previous line contains a Boolean operator. A    line may not have more tabs than the previous line in all other    cases.-   8. A line with fewer tabs than the line previous to it is a sibling    of the most recent line with the same number of tabs as the current    line.

Parametric Expression Rules

-   1. A line that begins with exactly one tab that is not followed by    TEXT=is the beginning of a Parametric Section.-   2. The valid Boolean Operators are AND (set intersection) and OR    (set union).-   3. The valid Parametric Types are EQ (equal), NE (not equal), II (is    in), NI (is not in).-   4. The Parametric Value NULL is only valid when the Parametric Type    is either EQ or NE.-   5. The Parametric Attribute indicates which column in the underlying    database to query on. Only those attributes defined as mapped to a    DL attribute are valid.-   6. A line may not have more than one additional tab from the    previous line, if the previous line contains a Boolean operator. A    line may not have more tabs than the previous line in all other    cases.-   7. A line with fewer tabs than the line previous to it is a sibling    of the most recent line with the same number of tabs as the current    line.    EQuery BNF Grammar

Search_Criteria := <Individual Query> | {<Individual Query>]* IndividualQuery := <Query_Header><Query_Body> Query Header := <Scope>=<Search_Level>:<Return_Attribute_List>\n Scope := ENTITY || GROUPSearch_Level := <Entity_Search_Level> || <Group_Search_Level>Entity_Search_Level := Name of any entity type defined in the groupattribute file Group_Search_Level := Name of any data model groupdefined in the groups file Return_Attribute_List :=<Attribute>[,<Attribute>]* Attribute :=<Parametric_Attribute>||<System_Attribute> Parametric_Attribute := Nameof a DIGITAL LIBRARY attribute defined in a group attribute fileSystem_Attribute := Name of an attribute defined in a group attributefile generated by system Query Body := <Text_Search_Section> |<Parametric_Section>] || <Parametric_Section> Text_Search_Section :=\tTEXT=<Text_Attribute> \n<Text_Search_Option> Text Attribute := Name ofan attribute defined in a group attribute file with a text indexText_Search_Option := <Text_Search_FreeText>[<Text_Search_Expression>]|| <Text_Search_Expression> Text_Search_FreeText := \t\t<String>,IT\nText_Search_Expression := <Text_Search_Term> ||<Text_Search_Boolean_Expression> Text_Search_Term := <TS_Tab_Level><Text_Search_Argument>,<Text_Search_Type>\n TS_Tab_Level := Thelevel/sublevel of tab nesting Text_Search_Argument := “<String>” String:= Any search string Text_Search_Type := EQ || NE || II ||NIText_Search_Boolean_Expression := <TS_Tab_Level><Boolean_Operator>\n<Text_Search_Expression> [<Text_Search_Expression>]*Boolean_Operator := AND || OR Text_Search_End_Term :=<Text_Search_Term><Text_Search_Term> Parametric Section:=\t<Parametric_Expression> Parametric_Expression := <Parametric_Term>|| <Parametric_Boolean_Expression> Parametric_Term :=<PM_Tab_Level><Parametric_Value>,<Parametric_Type><Parametric_Keyword>\n PM_Tab_Level := appropriate number of tabs forthis level Parametric_Value := “<String>” || NULL Parametric_Type := EQ|| NE || II || NI Parametric_Keyword := “<Parametric_Attribute>”Text_Search_Boolean_Expression := <PM_Tab_Level> <Boolean_Operator>·n<Parametric_Expression> [<Parametric_End_Term>]*Interface Specification

Native Language Call Arguments

-   -   Linkage:

int EQuery( char* pCriteriaBufferCriteria, char** ppResultsBuffer);

-   -   pCriteriaBuffer points to a null-terminated buffer containing        the search criteria. PResultsBuffer points to another pointer,        which will point to a null-terminated buffer containing the        search results.

The buffer needed to hold the results will be dynamically allocated, and*ppResultsBuffer will point to the new buffer. If there is no results,the results buffer is allocated, but is empty. If an error isencountered, the results buffer is not allocated, leaving*ppResultsBuffer set to NULL.

Command Line Arguments

-   -   Syntax:        -   EQuery <query file name><results file name>

<query file name> names a file containing the search criteria asdescribed in Appendix A. <results file name> names a file where thesearch results as described in Appendix B should be placed.

-   -   Example:        -   EQuery 012345678.qry 012345678.res

This will launch EQuery using the file called “012345678.qry” to get thequery search criteria. The hit results will be stored in the file“012345678.res”.

To initiate a search through the native language call, the user inputssearch terms via a static HTML search screen displayed in FIG. 22 Thesearch screen is invoked by clicking on the “Search Contents” button 240provided on the vertical menu bar of the Bookshelf page (see FIG. 11).An exemplary search screen is shown in FIG. 21A. The search screenincludes input fields appropriate for the search capabilities supported.The “Chapter Titles” field 232 and a “Section Titles” field 233 of thepresent example are provided in support of parametric searching of theTitle attribute defined in the Product Index Class. These fields are amatter of design choice and may be changed to specify any or allattributes defined in the data model. The “Index Words” field 231 isprovided for entering text search terms in support of free textsearching. By design choice, the search criteria entered into thesefields will be ANDed together, as indicated by the “AND's” between thefields. However, other Boolean operators may be supported Full Booleanlogic is preferably supported within all fields.

Assume that the user is interested in finding chapters with the string“Engineering” in the titles, and the chapters contain sections witheither “engineering” or “study” or “skills” in the titles, and the word“study” or “skills” is one of the index terms for the sections. To thatend, the user has entered the search terms “study OR skills” into thetext search field 231, “Engineering” into chapter title field 232, and“engineering OR study OR skills” into section title field 233, as shownin FIG. 21 A. By clicking on any “GO” button 234, the user invokes theSearch procedure.

The search procedure receives the search terms and formats it fordelivery to the EQuery search application. Input criteria from eachfield are treated as separate queries. Below is an example of theformatted search criteria, passed as the input parameter to Equery.

ENTITY=CHAPTER.C:Hits,Rank,Title,HitWords AND “engineering”,II,“Title”“FE”,EQ,“PE_ID” “1”,EQ,“Status” ENTITY=SECTION:Hits,Rank,Title,HitWordsAND OR “engineering”,II,“Title” “study”,II,“Title” “skills”,II,“Title”“FE”,EQ,“PE_ID” “1”,EQ,“Status” ENTITY=SECTION:Hits,Title,Rank,HitWordsTEXT=Index_Term OR “study”,II “skills”,II AND “FE”,EQ,“PE_ID”“1”,EQ,“Status”Additional parametric constraints may be appended at this time toimprove the efficiency of the search. For example, the search criteriaabove have been ANDed with the user's program ID (PE_ID) and a statusvalue equal to “1” (indicating that the prepublished text is availablefor use). In addition, the chapter title search criteria are ANDed withthe constraint of entity type equal to chapter, and section title searchcriteria are ANDed with the constraint of entity type equal to section.

EQuery receives the search criteria and reformats them as necessary forinput to the data repository. The query input format depends on thesearch support available. In the present example, the query isreformatted for input to the IBM DB2 Digital Library with TextMinersupport. This involves parsing the search criteria and mapping theattribute names known by the web site into the attribute names indigital library as defined by the ELOADER.INI configuration file, EQuerysends the following search conditions (as part of the query strings) tothe digital library OO API 42.

Query 1, Text Search condition: NONE Query 1, Parametric condition:COND=((E_EntityType == “CHAPTER.C”) AND ((E_Title LIKE “%engineering%”)AND (E_ProgramID == “FE”) AND (E_Status == “1”))) Query 2, Text Searchcondition: NONE Query 2, Parametric condition: COND=((E_EntityType ==“SECTION”) AND (((E_Title LIKE “%engineering%”) OR (E_Title LIKE%study%”) OR (E_Title LIKE “%skills%”)) AND (E_ProgramID == “FE”) AND(E_Status == “1”))) Query 3, Text Search condition (conceptually):COND=(‘study’ OR ‘skills’) Query 3, Parametric condition:COND=((E_EntityType == “SECTION”) AND ((E_ProgramID == “FE”) AND(E_Status == “1”)))

The OO API 42 receives this input, then sends the text search to TextMiner through the TextMiner API, and the parametric search to thedigital library. The TextMiner API and indexing requirements aredescribed in the Digital Library Text Search Using TextMiner ApplicationProgramming Reference, First Edition (September 1997) available from IBMCorporation.

A set of entities is returned by digital library 20 that matches thesearch criteria for each individual query. If more than one query isspecified, as in the example, then all queries are performed and theindividual result sets are combined via a set union operation andreturned as a single result set. During the union process, a hit mask isbuilt for the Entity (described in more detail subsequently) to indicatewhich one or more of individual queries returned the Entity. This hitmask is returned with the merged result set if the “Hit” term has beenspecified in the return attribute list. The Entities will be returned insequence-ID order.

Each query may list a subset of all possible attributes to be output foreach Entity found. Only attributes with non-NULL values will be placedin the output. The format of the attributes will be the same as theAttribute File as defined in “ATTRIBUTE Definitions” above. Additionalsystem generated attributes may be added to the list of attributes foreach item found. These may include a query-hit mask, text searchrelevance ranking, and hit words for titles and index terms, forexample.

Search Results Specification

The format of the Search Results is a merging of a Product StructureFile (PSF) and an Attribute File. Each hit from an Individual Query willproduce at least one line in the file. The line includes the Entity Typeand the Sequence_ID as defined in the original PSF. In addition, if anyattribute name was specified in the Return Attribute List and theattribute value is not NULL for this hit, the attribute name-value pairwill be included in a line with a leading exclamation mark.

Hits, Rank, and HitWords are special system attributes. To place onesuch attribute in the results, that attribute name is included in theReturn Attribute list. The Hits attribute is a “hit mask” comprising astring of bits indicating how may of the individual queries had hits. Itis available for each Entity in the merged result set. Hit masks aredescribed in more detail subsequently. Every character in the stringcorresponds to one Individual Query that has been executed. The firstcharacter in the string corresponds to the first query, the secondcharacter in the string corresponds to the second query, and so on. Ifthe Entity is present in the result set of a given query, that characterin the attribute value string will be a one. If the Entity is notpresent in the result set, the character will be a zero. One, more, orall (but never none) of the characters in the string will be one.

The Rank attribute is a number and it is available for only part of themerged result set. Rank is a number between 1 and 100 given byIntelligent Miner for Text to represent the relevance ranking of eachhit relative to all hits from one text search query. The attribute isavailable for each Entity hit from an Individual Query containing a TextSearch Criteria Term.

The HitWords attribute is available only for part of the merged resultset. More specifically, it is only available for an Entity hit of typeSECTION. When included as part of the Return Attribute list, up to twosystem-generated attributes, section_sectiontitle and section_idx, maybe included in the results. The section_sectiontitle attribute keeps alist of word hits in a section title, with a comma as the wordseparator. The section_idx attribute keeps a list of word hits in theindex terms or key terms for a section, with comma as the wordseparator. The existence of these attributes is for applications todetermine which words to highlight when the hit document is displayed.To implement these, user inputs for querying section title or indexterms are parsed AS IS into individual words and stored in theattributes.

Below is an example of a merged results file returned as the outputparameter from EQuery for the preceding queries:

SECTION:013011037X.10.03.00 !Hits:010 !Title:Social Engineering!search-sectiontitle:engineering,study,skillsCHAPTER.C:0130131490.02.00.00 !Hits:100 !Title:An Introduction toEngineering Problem Solving !search-chaptertitle:engineeringSECTION:0130131490.02.04.00 !Hits:010 !Title:An EngineeringProblem-Solving Methodology!search-sectiontitle:engineering,study,skillsCHAPTER.C:0130808598.02.00.00 !Hits:100 !Title:Studying Engineering: TheKeys to Success !search-chaptertitle:engineeringSECTION:0130808598.02.02.00 !Hits:001 !Title:Commitment !Rank:24!search-idx:study,skills SECTION:0130808598.02.03.00 !Hits:001!Title:Application !Rank:24 !search-idx:study,skillsSECTION:0130808598.02.04.00 !Hits:001 !Title:Strategy !Rank:24!search-idx:study,skills SECTION:0130808598.02.05.00 !Hits:001!Title:Perseverance !Rank:24 !search-idx:study,skillsSECTION:0130808598.02.06.00 !Hits:001 !Title:Associations !Rank:24!search-idx:study,skills CHAPTER.C:0130808598.03.00.00 !Hits:100!Title:Introduction to Engineering and Engineering Study!search-chaptertitle:engineering SECTION:0130808598.03.02.00 !Hits:011!Title:What Is Engineering?!search-sectiontitle:engineering,study,skills !Rank:24!search-idx:study,skills SECTION:0130808598.03.03.00 !Hits:001!Title:What Do Engineers Do? !Rank:22 !search-idx:study,skillsSECTION:0130808598.03.04.00 !Hits:011 !Title:Why Choose to StudyEngineering? !search-sectiontitle:engineering,study,skills !Rank:31!search-idx:study,skills SECTION:0130808598.03.05.00 !Hits:011!Title:Equipping Yourself for Engineering Study!search-sectiontitle:engineering,study,skills !Rank:64!search-idx:study,skills SECTION:0130808598.03.06.00 !Hits:001!Title:Cooperative Education Programs (Co-ops) and Internships !Rank:24!search-idx:study,skills SECTION:0130808598.04.03.00 !Hits: 010!Title:Making Effective Use of&nbsp;the&nbsp;Engineering&nbsp; Professor!search-sectiontitle:engineering,study,skillsSECTION:0130808598.05.04.00 !Hits:011 !Title:Group Study!search-sectiontitle:engineering,study,skills !Rank:24!search-idx:study,skills SECTION:0130808598.05.06.00 !Hits:010!Title:Engineering Ethics and Code of Student Behavior!search-sectiontitle:engineering,study,skillsCHAPTER.C:0130808598.06.00.00 !Hits:100 !Title:Key Strategies forMaximizing Performance in Engineering Courses!search-chaptertitle:engineering SECTION:0130808598.06.02.00 !Hits:001!Title:Time Management Strategies !Rank:24 !search-idx:study,skillsSECTION:0130808598.06.03.00 !Hits:010 !Title:Preparing for anEngineering Course: Making Sure Your Prerequisite Works!search-sectiontitle:engineering,study,skillsSECTION:0130808598.06.08.00 !Hits:011 !Title:Using Tutors and StudyGuides !search-sectiontitle:engineering,study,skills !Rank:31!search-idx:study,skills SECTION:0130808598.07.03.00 !Hits:001!Title:Preparing for Examinations: Getting Organized !Rank:24!search-idx:study,skills CHAPTER.C:0130808598.10.00.00 !Hits:100!Title:Developing Engineering Skills !search-chaptertitle: engineeringSECTION:0130808598.10.02.00 !Hits:011 !Title:Communication Skills!search-sectiontitle:engineering,study,skills !Rank:47!search-idx:study,skills SECTION:0130808598.10.03.00 !Hits:001!Title:Developing Your Creativity !Rank:33 !search-idx:study,skillsSECTION:0130808598.11.03.00 !Hits:001 !Title:Continuing Your StudiesTowards a Graduate Degree !Rank:24 !search-idx:study,skillsCHAPTER.C:013254749X.02.00.00 !Hits:100 !Title:Engineering andElectronic Worksheets !search-chaptertitle:engineeringSECTION:013254749X.02.03.00 !Hits:010 !Title:The Engineering Method!search-sectiontitle:engineering,study,skillsSECTION:013254749X.02.04.00 !Hits:010 !Title:Issues in Engineering andData Analysis !search-sectiontitle:engineering,study,skillsCHAPTER.C:013254749X.05.00.00 !Hits:100 !Title:Engineering Computation!search-chaptertitle:engineering SECTION:013254749X.10.02.00 !Hits:010!Title:Engineering and the Internet!search-sectiontitle:engineering,study,skills

The results set can contain entities at different levels in thehierarchy. For example, the previous search contains entities at thechapter and section levels. The preceding results are received by thesearch procedure in application layer 28, where they may be filtered(e.g., to remove any sections that do not belong to chapters that arehits), parsed, and displayed. An example of a results screen is shown inFIG. 21B.

9. Using Hit Masks to Search Hierarchical Data

As noted in the previous section, the hierarchical data model presentsan interesting challenge—how to perform a search across entities atdifferent hierarchical levels. The challenge arises because thehierarchical entities can be stored without inherited properties. Anentity's inherited property is one that is defined on one of theentity's parents. For example, a chapter entity has a property, name.Each section within the chapter inherits the name property. The nameproperty is stored only on the chapter entity. Due to storage space,query performance and load performance considerations, inheritedproperties are not stored on an entity.

Suppose a user wishes to perform the following query.

-   -   Find all the books written by Dr. Seuss containing a chapter        title with the word “Cat”        In this query the property, author, defined on the entity, book,        is searched for an author, Dr. Seuss and a chapter entity's        property, title, is searched for the word, Cat. At first glance,        this query appears to be a normal parametric query with two        Boolean conditions. However, after closer inspection this is not        a normal parametric query because it involves attributes of        entities of different hierarchical levels: Book and Chapter. For        this reason, this query is broken into two parametric queries:    -   1. Find those entities of type=book and author=Dr. Seuss.    -   2. Find those entities of type=chapter and title containing the        word “Cat”        The two sets of results never intersect because they are for        different entities. The first results consist of book entity        matches, the second set of chapter entity matches. These entity        matches for the query criteria are also called “hits”.

Since inherited properties are not stored within the datastore, the bookentity and chapter entity do not share common properties. Therefore, ifan intersection is performed on these two sets of hits, the resultantset is empty. However, the goal of the search was to find all the bookentities satisfying both criteria.

One of the keys to defining meaningful results for the two parametricqueries described above is to define the entity expected in the results.For example, in the above query the book entity is returned. However, itmay be desired to return the chapter entity to the user. Therefore, anyproposed query interface must provide the application developer freedomto decide which entity is to be returned.

Examples of entities defined in the results include:

-   -   Only the section hits that belong to chapter hits which in turn        belong to book hits;    -   The appropriate book hits, chapter hits and section hits, where        all the section hits belong to one chapter hit which in turn        belongs to one book hit;    -   A section hit that does not belong to any chapter hit;    -   A chapter hit that does not belong to any book hit; or    -   A book hit that does not contain any chapter hit or section hit.

This is really a question about how to perform logical AND/OR Booleanoperators on the result sets across different entity levels. The answervaries depending on the needs of a particular application as well as theexpectation from its target users. In order to accommodate differentapplication needs and user expectations, the individual results arecombined via a set union, and for each entity a bit stream known as ahit mask is included to indicate which query a specific entitysatisfied. The application's query code does not need to know thespecifics regarding the current hierarchical data model. The digitallibrary API 16 provides the application's program with enoughinformation so the application program can perform filtering on the hitsand decide the entity to be returned to the user.

Referring to FIG. 6, the webserver 26 makes calls to an applicationprogram interface layer, which here comprises both application layer 28and API layer 30. The application program, in turn, makes calls to thedigital library API 16. The digital library API 16 makes the programcalls to the datastore to assemble the results into hit mask, uniqueidentifier tuples. This hitmask-unique identifier tuple is describedlater. At present it is important to understand the breakdown of thelogic with respect to program interfaces.

As illustrated above, when there is a complex query against multipleentity types, it is necessary to break the query down into multiplequeries, each against a specific entity type. Two queries can beperformed on the same entity type, but the same query is never performedon multiple entity types.

In the present embodiment, the queries are executed as parametric andfree text queries, yielding multiple sets of results. The multiple setsare combined via a union into one single set. During the process ofunion, a hit mask is built for each entity processed to indicate whichone or more individual queries returned the entity. The total number ofindividual queries determines the total length of the hit mask, and eachbit has an initial value of zero.

If a hit is merged in from the results for individual query 1, the firstbit is set to 1. If a hit is merged in from the results for individualquery 2, the second bit is set to 1, and so on. If an entity is a hit inboth results set, both bits will be set to 1. For any particular entitytype in the combined set, its corresponding hit mask will contain one ormore 1's.

A hit mask is a bit string, a string of 0's and 1's. Each bitcorresponds to one parametric/free text query against a specific entity.A bit with a value 1 indicates the entity is a hit for the correspondingquery; a bit with a value 0 indicates the entity is not a hit for thequery. In the previous example, the query was broken into two parametricqueries: one query on the book entity and one on the chapter entity. Theexample below shows the queries being performed against the contents ofa typical datastore with the resultant hit masks.

Queries

-   -   1. Find those entities of type=book and author=Dr. Seuss.    -   2. Find those entities of type=chapter and title containing the        word “Cat”

Unique Datastore Contents Hit mask* Identifier ♦ Book-Cat In The Hat byDr. Seuss 10 0123456789.00.00 ∘ Chapter-Tee Totaler 00 0123456789.01.00∘ Chapter-The Fat Cat 01 0123456789.02.00 ♦ Book-Horton The Elephant byDr. Seuss 10 0291123421.00.00 ∘ Chapter-I Meant What I Said 000291123421.01.00 ♦ Book-Cannery Row by John Steinbeck 000412856798.00.00 *The left bit corresponds to query one and the rightbit corresponds to query two

The above hit masks represent the hits for the queries. For example, TheCat In The Hat book with author Dr. Seuss matches the first query, butnot the second one. Therefore, the hit mask is 10. Likewise, thechapter, The Fat Cat, is a hit for the second query so its hit mask is01.

Each query result is returned with its unique sequence identifier,previously described. Recall that the sequence identifier is in theform: XXXXXXXXXX.CC.SS., where the 10 X's are the ISBN number, CC is thechapter number and SS is the section number. Once the hit masks andunique identifiers have been returned to the application program fromthe API layer 30, the application program can perform a logical AND/ORupon them. The application program provides the freedom to choose howunions and intersections are performed on the hits.

The manner in which the application program of the present embodimentuses the hit masks and unique identifiers to filter the combined set ofresults will now be described. In the example above involving The FatCat, a problem exists in performing a union or intersection on The FatCat chapter entity hit mask, 01 with the Cat In The Hat book entity hitmask 10. Since The Fat Cat is contained within the Cat In The Hat, itsatisfies both queries. Its hit mask needs to inherit the properties ofthe hit mask of the parent book to have a value of 11, indicating thatit satisfies both queries. The Cat In The Hat contains a 1 for the firstquery is a book container entity. Thus bit representing query one in thehit masks of all entities that the book contains (i.e. children, grandchildren, etc.) should be set to “1”. Recall, however, that inheritedproperties such as parenthood are not retained with the datastore.

The solution to this dilemma lies in the unique identifier's format,which contains information about the hierarchical relationship of theseentities. The Cat In The Hat's unique identifier is 0123456789.00.00 andthe unique identifier of The Fat Cat is 0123456789.02.00. By matchingall unique identifiers with the same XXXXXXXXXX values, theseidentifiers allow us to determine that The Fat Cat is contained by TheCat In The Hat. Since The Cat In The Hat contained a 1 for the firstquery, The Fat Cat's and Tee Totaler hit mask are changed to values of11 and 10, respectively. The following two phase process can be employedto obtain this result.

Phase One—Hashtable Creation. The first step is to build a nested hashtable that reflects the relationships of the entity hits in terms of thehierarchical data model. This can be done based on the uniqueidentifiers. For each entity in the results, place the hit mask in anested hash table at the appropriate entity. The keys of the hashtableare unique identifiers and the values are the hit masks bit streams. Thediagram below shows the hashtables for the previous example. Once allthe entities are processed, a nested hashtable exists reflecting thecontainment relationships.

<Book Hashtable> Key 1: 10 Value: <Chapter Hashtable> Key 1: 00 Value:<Section Hashtable>... Key 2: 01 Value: <Section Hashtable>... <BookHashtable> Key 1: 10 Value: <Chapter Hashtable> Key 1: 00 Value:<Section Hashtable>... <Book Hashtable> Key 1: 00 Value: <ChapterHashtable>...

Phase Two—Filtering. Once the hashtable is constructed, applicationprogram uses simple Boolean logic to obtain the hits. In the example,the desired results are all books by Dr. Seuss containing a chapter withthe word Cat in the title. The filtering process starts on the bookhashtable keys looking for a hit mask of 10. There are two books:. TheCat In the Hat, Horton The Elephant) satisfying this criteria. Thefiltering process continues on the chapter hashtables within these twobooks looking for hit masks of 01. The chapter, The Fat Cat, is locatedand therefore is a hit for the complex query. Thus the containingbook's, The Cat In The Hat, unique identifier is returned.

One of the advantages of the above two phase process is the code reuseand flexibility of the returned entity. For example, the chapter, TheFat Cat, can be returned instead of the contained book without changingthe phase one process. The only changes required are to alter the endprocessing on phase two. This is important since the returned entityvaries from website to website.

Search and hit mask generation procedures may be performed by softwareand may be tangibly embodied in a program product such as a CD rom orfloppy disk, or stored in a computer system's nonvolatile memory. Theuse of hit masks for hierarchical document models provides manybenefits. It is an efficient solution from a performance perspectivebecause a minimum amount of information is transmitted back to the Webapplication. In addition, the solution is configurable in that itpermits decision making of OR, AND and returned entities at theapplication layer 28. The query code is generic and flexible enough formultiple hierarchical data models. Performance is improved due to theeasy Boolean logic performed on hit masks to find results. And finally,this approach minimizes space requirements for storing the hierarchicaldata model by avoiding storage of inherited properties

10. System Administrator Interface and Functions

A system administrator can perform a number of functions throughinterface 24. An interface application first displays a main menu ofoptions. In the present embodiment, three options 251, 252, 253 areavailable to the user as hypertext links, as shown in FIG. 22A. Two ofthese pertain to the content selection path of FIG. 6: “Approve User”251 and “Make Products Available” 252.

The “Approve User” option 251 is used to promote new users from a“guest” status to an “approved user” status. When a user registers withthe compilation system for the first time, he is assigned a guest statusthat authorizes him to create and submit CBO's. However, a compilationwill not be approved for publishing unless the user has been approved.The system administrator basis his approval decision on a verificationof the user as a valid user (e.g., as a bona fide university professor).

The approval function is invoked by clicking on link 251. This actioninvokes an approval function in application layer 28 which issues aquery to the User Table for all users whose “security” attribute isequal to “G”? The results are returned to the approval function, parsed,and displayed as a list of users and corresponding user information. Anexample of an approval list is shown in FIG. 22B. Attributes displayedinclude the user name 256, university 257, department 258 andregistration date 259. Beside each username is a select box. By checkingdesired ones of the select boxes and clicking on the “Commit” button255, the system administrator causes the “security” attribute value inthe User Table to be changed to “F” (full access authority). The user isthen returned to the main menu of FIG. 22A.

The “Make Products Available” option 252 is used to designateprepublished content products available for use in compilations ofcontent. When prepublished content is first loaded into digital library20, it is assigned a default status of “unavailable”. This status isindicated by a “U” value in the “Status” column defined by the ProductsIndex Class. Unavailable products may not be included in a bookshelf,and may not be returned from a search content request. A prepublishedproduct does not become accessible until this attribute value is changedto “A”, indicating that the product is now available for use.

The system administrator initiates the “Make Products Available”function by clicking on link 251. This action causes a correspondingfunction in application layer 28 to display a list of products. In thepresent embodiment, this list appears as shown in FIG. 22C. It includesthe book titles 260, and a corresponding select box 261 beside eachtitle. By checking desired products for promotion and clicking on“Commit” button 262, the user invokes the EProductSetState function andcauses the product state to change from “U” to “A”. The EProductSetStatefunction is described below.

EProductSetState

Description

When a prepublished content product is first loaded into the system, thestatus is Unavailable for each entity in the product. The web site'sadministrator then sets the status to Available when he feels confidentthat all the pieces of the product have been loaded completely andcorrectly. The administrative application uses this routine to set theproduct status to available.

Functional Processing

-   I. Locate the existing copyright product entity that matches the    sequence id parameter.-   II. Locate the entities within that product entity by finding    entities that are prefixed by the same sequence id.-   III. For each entity found, set its status to the product status    passed (“0”=Unpublished, “1” =Published).

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Sequence id Product stateOutputs Errors RC_NOT_FOUND RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   Product

11. Submitting a CBO

When the user has completed creating his custom book outline, he maysubmit it to the approval process by clicking on “Submit Request” button180. This action invokes the ECBOSubmit and ERequestStatus proceduresdescribed below.

ECBOSubmit

Description

This routine submits the CBO when the user has completed creating hisbook and is ready to submit the order. This function performs somepolicy checks against that CBO and then creates a Request in the Requestentity. It then makes the CBO available to the System Administrationapplication for approval. The Custom Publishing subsystem then retrievesthe Request when it processes.

Functional Processing

-   I. Verify that the CBO id passed is valid.-   II. Check the volume virtual page count limit in the CBO. If total    virtual page count for each of the volumes go above or below the    volume virtual page count limit, the volumes are reorganized.-   III. Check the CBO minimum virtual page count limit in the CBO.    Verify that the total CBO virtual page count exceeds the CBO minimum    virtual page count limit.-   IV. Verify that the CBO contains at least one section from one    prepublished content product.-   V. Create a new order request for this CBO with all the information    passed in.-   VI. Update the new Order Request with information for all the    volumes in the CBO.-   VI. Mark the CBO status as Submitted (“2”) with a call to    ERequestStatus.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Userid Author title Author firstname Author last name University Department CBO id Course name Coursenumber Course registration number Estimated enrollment Term Term startdate Bookstore date Desk copy count Supplement count Alternate address 1Alternate address 2 Alternate address 3 Alternate city Alternatestate/province Alternate zip code/postal Alternate country Outputs Newrequest order number Errors RC_NOT_FOUND RC_INVALID_CBO RC_UNDER_MINIMUMRC_NO_PRE_PUB_SECTION RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   CustomBookOutline    -   Request    -   RequestAux        ERequestUpdateStatus

Description

When a user's Order Request moves through the workflow from creation toapproval/retum/rejection to completion, the approval status of the OrderRequest is changed in the digital library Request Index class to reflectits progress.

Functional Processing

-   I. Search for one Order Request with the Request id passed.-   II. Verify that there is exactly one match for the Request id.-   III. Update the status of the Order Request found.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Request id Request statusOutputs Errors RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   E_Request

The following support function is also provided in application layer 28and pertains to the creation of a CBO.

EGetProgramAttributes

Description

This retrieves attributes for a particular program from the Programentity.

Functional Processing

-   I. Search for any program record with the program id passed.-   II. Verify that there is exactly one match for the program id.-   III. Retrieve all the attributes from the program record.-   IV. Export all the attributes as one big string into the results    buffer.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Program id Outputs Resultsbuffer Errors RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   Program    -   ProgramAux        C. Request Processing Path

The content management system of the present invention includes abackend path for submitting a compilation for approval and publication,as shown in FIG. 23. This path begins with a user's submission of a CBOfor approval previously described.

As shown in FIG. 23, the request processing path includes a systemadministration facility for retrieving submitted CBO from the digitallibrary content server(s) 18 through API layer 30, and placing thepending CBO content into an unformatted Product Structure File. Thesystem administration facility 24 presents the PSF into a format easilyviewed by the editor. If the editor approves the CBO, the state of theCBO is updated to approved.

A background application is run periodically to process all approvedCBO's which have not been published. This background application,request generator 32, retrieves a list of all approved CBO's awaitingpublishing. If the CBO is approved and the submitter (author) has beenapproved (a.k.a. granted full access) then the CBO is extracted from thedata store 20 via the API layer 30 in the PSF format. An ISBN number isassigned to the CBO and all related volumes. This ISBN number is storedwithin the datastore in the Request (i.e. CBOISBN) and RequestAux (i.e.VolumeISBN) entity. This PSF format is stored into one or more files onthe local file system and the CBO status is updated to published. Due tothe newly assigned ISBN values the resultant PSF sequence ids(XXXXXXXXX.CC.SS) within the PSF are not correct. These files stillretain the original pre-pub book ISBN values. The formatter isresponsible for updating these sequence ids in the following step.

Another background application, formatter 34, is run periodically toprocess the PSF files residing on the request generator's 32 filesystem. Therefore, this application must have access to 32's filesystem. This can be achieved via NFS clients or the like. The formatterscans the files within the request generator file system. Upon locatinga PSF file, it is parsed and the sequence ids are retained. Theformatter then queries the data store 20 via the API layer 30 to extractthe real content for this sequence id (a pre-published book or UPM).Upon retrieving the real content, the sequence id is altered to reflectthe CBO's ISBN number, chapter and section numbers. The new sequence idis stored in the PSF file and the content is stored into files residingin the same directory.

Product Generator 36 receives the input CBO files and reformats theminto a desired publishing format. In the present example, the desiredpublishing format is a Framemaker format, although conversion to otherformats may be supported in addition to or in lieu of Framemaker formatconversion. The product generator of the present embodiment is a 4GLapplication.

The resultant CBO Framemaker files are now forwarded to publishingsystem 38, a printing and distribution system that uses a Framemakerfile set in printing and distributing text books.

CBO Workflow

Status Values. The following table lists the acceptable CBO Status andthe Request Status values that are assigned to the “ApprovalStatus”columns in the CBO and Request index classes of digital library 20.

0 Active Available to the instuctor to reuse 1 Submitted Submitted hythe instructor 2 Approved Approved by editorial and ready for publishing3 Rejected Rejected by editorial and no longer able to be revised 4Completed Completed custom publishing

CBO Workflow States. FIG. 24 is a CBO status workflow state diagramillustrating the various states of the Request approval status, CBOapproval status, and user access level (the value stored in the“Security” column of the User Table) that affect the workflow of a CBOthrough the described process. It shows the values of each variable atdifferent states and the action that changes the state.

1. System Administrator Approval Process

As previously discussed, Custom Book Outlines are created through theweb user interface 22 from pre-published content and user-providedmaterial, then submitted for approval. During the submit process, theuser enters additional information or override information through theweb pages. When he has entered all the required information, the requestis stored in digital library 20 as a Request entity, and the CBO statusis changed from “1” (Working or Active state) to “2” (Submitted state)in the CBO Index class (Approval Status attribute).

An editor reviews pending requests through the system administrator webinterface 24 by selecting the “Edit/Review/Approve CBO's” option 253 ofFIG. 22A. This action invokes an approval process that issues a call tothe ECBOList function. The ECBO List function, described below, issues aquery to digital library 20 for all CBO's with a status equal to “2”.

ECBOList

Description

This function returns a list of all CBO's that are stored in the digitallibrary for a specified Program that are in a specified status in theCBO workflow (e.g., all “Active” CBO's in the Freshman Engineeringprogram). The status and program are passed as parameters. This functionis used by the system administration facility to obtain all CBO's in asubmitted state. It is also used by the request generator 32 to obtainall CBO's in an approved state.

-   1. Verify that program id passed is valid.-   2. Search for CBO's with the program id and the CBO status    specified.-   3. For each CBO found, send back the CBO id, the Type, Title, and    Creator ID.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Program id CBO state Outputs CBOid list Errors RC_INVALID_OR_MISSING_INPUT RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   CustomBookOutline    -   Program

The CBO's returned by the ECBOList function are parsed by the approvalprocess and displayed on a Submitted Custom Books screen. An example ofan approval screen is shown in FIG. 22D. It includes a list of CBOtitles 271 and owners 272, where the titles provide hypertext links tothe CBO's themselves. Clicking on a CBO title invokes an approvalprocess that calls the ECBOGet and ECBOGetUPM functions. The returnedCBO and user content are parsed and displayed to the editor on anapproval screen.

A portion of the approval screen of the present embodiment is shown inFIG. 22E. It presents the editor with the custom book outline thatincludes the content associated with each UPM element. For example, inthe CBO shown Chapter 1 contains a first UPM element 288 (UPM refersspecifically to “Instructor Provided Text”). The UPM title (“New UPMSection”) is displayed at 284 as a hypertext link. It is also providedin an editable title field 287, and the UPM's corresponding content(“UPM Content”) is contained in an editable field 285. Thus the editoris able to review and edit the content for correctness andappropriateness. He may also insert editorial suggestions and commentspertaining to this UPM into field 286. In addition, prepublished sectiontitles are provided as hypertext link to their corresponding content. Ifdesired, the editor may view the content of any section by clicking onits link

When the editor has completed his review, he may approve, reject, orreturn the CBO with editorial comments by clicking on one of the buttons281, 282, 283 at the top of the screen. In the event of rejection, theCBO approval status stored in the digital library CBO Index class ischanged to “3” by the ECBOSetState function. The CBO will now bedisplayed on the user's Welcome screen with a “Reject” status, and theowner will net be permitted to manipulate the book any further. A CBOreturn causes ECBOSetState to set the CBO approval status value back to“1”, and the editorial comments to be sent to the owner via e-mail. Inthis case the owner is allowed to alter the book in an attempt tocorrect situations identified by the editor. Lastly, CBO approval statusto “2”. All CBO's with an approved status will be retrieved by theRequest Generator 32.

2. Request Generator

Description. The Request Generator 32 application polls digital library20 to determine which submitted requests are in an approved state butstill are not extracted. It will only publish those CBO's having anapproval status of “2” and an owner status of “F” (i.e. Full Access). Anadministrator invokes the request generator 32 on the command line usingthe ra.pl executable. The ra.pl executable calls the rasetup.pl scriptwhich queries the digital library 20 for CBO's having a CBO Status equalto “2” and an owner's Access Level equal to “F”. For these CBO's, itsets the Request approval status to “2” in the Request Index class Uponcompletion of rasetup.pl, the ra.pl procedure is invoked and places allCBO's having a Request Status equal to “2” intothe/request/esource/order directory via the ERequestList functiondescribed below. This directory is later accessed by an EPGSetup NTprogram invoked by formatter 34.

The Request Generator 32 creates an Intermediate Product SpecificationFile (INT), a Cover Page Customization file (CPC), and a Title PageCustomization file (TPC). Request Generator 32 also invokes a procedurecalled rgisbn to generate an ISBN for each custom volume within a custombook, and one for the CBO itself. For example, a custom publication withtwo volumes will generate three total ISBNs. The new ISBN(s) are storedin digital library 20 by the ERequestISBN procedure, described below.

Inputs

-   -   Digital Library Requests    -   Digital Library attribute data (Program, Product)        Outputs    -   Intermediate Product Specification        File:/request/esource/order/<short-isbn>/<short-isbn>.INT    -   Cover Page Customization        file:/request/esource/order/<short-isbn>/<short-isbn>.CPC    -   Title Page Customization        file:/request/esource/order/<short-isbn>/<short-isbn>.TPC    -   Request Notification message    -   New Title Setup message    -   Request Order message    -   Desk Copy Order message    -   Desk Copy Approval message        Functional Processing

ra.pl

-   -   1. Invoke rasetup.pl        -   a) Determine which Requests have been submitted and approved            via ERequestList, then retrieve the CBO definition for each            of these Requests.        -   b) Find Requests with a CBO Status equal to “2” for users            with Access Level equal to “F”        -   c) Change the Request Status to “2” for those found    -   2. Invoke rgPR.pl        -   a) Use a subset of the CBO attributes to build the INT file        -   b) Use data in the CBO to build the CPC file        -   c) Use data in the CBO to build the TPC file    -   3. Assign an ISBN to the custom publication and store it into        digital library index classes via a call to ERequestISBN        -   a) Read next ISBN number from the ISBN file        -   b) Remove ISBN number from the ISBN file        -   c) Assign an ISBN to each volume in the CBO        -   d) For multi-volume CBO's, assign an ISBN to the Value Pack            containing all volumes    -   4. Extract UPM from Digital Library        -   a) Retrieve UPM        -   b) Modify UPM to treat the owner name as an author attribute            on the <UPM>markup tag.    -   5. Perform royalty calculations        -   a) Sum the page counts for each pre-published ISBN included            in the CBO to get a Total ISBN Page Count        -   b) Sum the page counts for UPM, Preface, TOC, and Index to            get the Total ISBN Page Count for the generated ISBN        -   c) Calculate a percentage for each ISBN, both pre-published            and custom, by dividing the Total ISBN Page Count by the CBO            Page Count    -   6. Invoke rggen.pl        -   a) Format and send the Request Notification message        -   b) Format and send the New Title Setup message        -   c) Format and send the Request Order Info message        -   d) Format and send the Desk Copy Order message        -   e) Format and send the Desk Copy Approval message    -   7. Change the Request Status and the CBO Status to “4”        (completed) ERequestList

Description

This routine returns a list of the Order Requests with a particularRequest Status. In most cases, this will be looking for a Request Statusof “2”, which is approved.

Functional Processing

-   I. Search for Order Requests with the Request status passed.-   II. For each Order Request found, return the Request id, User id,    CBO id, Book store date, and estimated enrollment.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Request status Outputs OrderRequest list Errors RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   Request        ERequestAssignISBN

Description

When an Order Request is processed by the Request Generator, a new ISBNis generated and assigned to the Order Request. This routine stores theISBNs into the Request and RequestAux Index Classes.

Functional Processing

-   I. Search for one Order Request with the Request id passed.-   II. Verify that there is exactly one match for the Request id.-   III. If the volume id passed is null, there is only one volume    involved. Update the package ISBN with the newly assigned ISBN    value.-   IV. If the volume id passed is not null, locate the volume specified    and update its ISBN with the newly assigned ISBN value.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Request id Volume id AssignedISBN Outputs Errors RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   Request    -   RequestAux        Other Back-end Support Functions

Other API layer 30 functions invoked by the Request Generator 32 armdescribed below.

ERequestGet

Description

This returns the attributes for a specific Order Request from theRequest entity.

Functional Processing

-   I. Search for one Order Request with the Request id passed.-   II. Verify that there is exactly one match for the Request id.-   III. Retrieve all the attributes for the Order Request. See    Attribute Format below for more details.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname Request id Outputs Order Requestdescription Errors RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   Request    -   RequestAux

!<attrname>:<value><carriage return> Example: !ApprovalStatus:1!UserID:testprof !CBOID:XT3QH7YOI$HFBS16 !AuthorTitle:ms!AuthorFirstName:jan !AuthorLastName:murray !University:purdue!Department:cs !CourseName:intro !CourseNumber:101!CourseRegNumber:cs101 !Term:Fall 1999 !TermStartDate:19990912!BookStoreDate:19990815 !AltAddress1:41 Waldron !AltAddress2:MS717A!AltAddress3:-alt-3- !AltCity:W. Lafayette !AltState:IN!AltZip:47610-5555 !AltCountry:537020568 !EstEnrollment:175!DeskCopyCount:4 !SuppCount:4 !ReceiptDate:19990327140527 !TotalPrice:!CPDPrice: !ValuePackPrice: !CPDISBN: !PackageISBN:0130296686 !Volume!VolumeISBN:013029666X !VolumeID:V1 !Volume !VolumeISBN:0130296678!VolumeID:V2 Note: This CBO is a Multi-Volume CBO containing 2 volumes.Each volume has an ISBN (i.e. VolumeISBN) and the entire CBO has an ISBN(i.e. PackageISBN)ERequestExistsForCBO

Description

Check to see whether there is any Request Order corresponding to the CBOid of interest.

Functional Processing

-   I. Search for any Order Request with the CBO id passed.-   II. Return 1 if there is at least one match. Return 0 if there is no    match.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname CBO id Outputs Found? (0,1)Errors RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   Request        ERequestGetForCBO

Description

Ids of all the Order Requests that correspond to the CBO id are returnedin a list.

Functional Processing

-   I. Search for any Order Request with the CBO id passed.-   II. For each Order Request found, save its Request id.

Parameter List

Inputs DSUsername DSPassword DSHostname CBO id Outputs Request id listErrors RC_SYSTEM_ERROR

Index Classes

-   -   Request

Intermediate Product Specification File (INT). For each volume, anIntermediate Product Specification File (INT) is generated by RequestGenerator 32. The file is named <short-isbn>.INT and is written to anOrder Directory in a subdirectory named <short-ISBN>. Request Generatorcreates this file by retrieving the Request and the CBO from digitallibrary 20. A sample file format is shown below.

PRODUCT:<newisbn>.00.00.00 FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT: CHAPTER.C: SECTION:<oldisbn>.nn.nn.nnUPM_SECTION:mm !UPM_SECTION_AUTHOR:Author HereSECTION:<oldisbn>.nn.nn.nn CHAPTER.C:FRONT_BACK_ELEMENT:<oldisbn>.nn.nn.nn SECTION:<oldisbn>.nn.nn.nnSECTION:<oldisbn>.nn.nn.nn FRONT_BACK_ELEMENT:<oldisbn>.nn.nn.nnCHAPTER.C: SECTION:<oldisbn>.nn.nn.nn SECTION:<oldisbn>.nn.nn.nnSECTION:<oldisbn>.nn.nn.nn FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT:In the INT file, <newisbn> is the ISBN for the volume, <oldisbn>is theISBN of the book the section originally came from, nn.nn.nn is thechapter and section number of the section as it appeared in the originalbook, and mm is sequence id.

UPM Content (seqid). For each UPM content element, the formatter 34 PGSetup procedure calls ERetrieve to get the content and then writes acontent file. This file is named <sequence id>.SGM is written to the PGDone Directory in a subdirectory named <short-ISBN>. The UPM is bemodified to treat the owner name marked within the INT file as an authorattribute on the UPM markup. For example:

Original UPM <UPM> <TITLE>Digital Fundamentals</TITLE> <text>Text UPMfollows here</text></UPM> <UPM> <TITLE>Digital Fundamentals II</TITLE><code> if a=b then do this else do that </code> </UPM> Modified UPM <UPMinstructor=“Joe Professor” <TITLE>Digital Fundamentals</TITLE><text>Text UPM follows here</text></UPM> <UPM instructor=“JoeProfessor”> <TITLE>Digital Fundamentals II</TITLE > <code>if a=b then dothis else do that </code> </UPM>

3. Formatter

Description. The Formatter 34 process is defined by the EPGsetupprocedure. EPGsetup retrieves CBO content from digital library 20 andplaces it into a file system directory for use by the Product Generator32. EPGsetup then reads the INT file created by Request Generator 32 inthe previous step and calls ERetrieve to get the content elements fromthe digital library 20. The content, POF, CPC, and TPC files are placedin the PG directory, in a subdirectory named <short-isbn>, which isbased on the ISBN of the custom publication.

Inputs

-   -   Intermediate Product Specification File:        e:\order\<short-isbn>\<short-isbn>.INT    -   Cover Page Customization File:        e:\order\<short-isbn>\<short-isbn>.CPC    -   Title Page Customization File:        e:\order\<short-isbn>\<short-isbn>.TPC    -   UPM Content: e:\order\<short-isbn>\<upm-id>.UPM        Outputs    -   Product Specification File: e:\pg\<short-isbn>\<short-isbn>.PSF    -   Product Override File: e:\pg\<short-isbn>\<short-isbn>.POF    -   Cover Page Customization File:        e:\pg\<short-isbn>\<short-isbn>.CPC    -   Title Page Customization File:        e:\pg\<short-isbn>\<short-isbn>.TPC    -   SGML Content Files: e:\pg\<short-isbn>\<sequence-id>.SGM    -   SGML Attribute Files: e:\pg\<short-isbn>\<sequence-id>.ATR    -   Associated Component Content Files:        e:\pg\<short-isbn>\HiRes\<sequence-id>.<extension> (TIF or EPS)    -   UPM Content: e:\pg\<short-isbn>\<sequence-id>.UPM        Functional Processing

EPGsetup

-   -   1. Poll the e:\order directory to find any        <short-isbn>directories created    -   2. Process each INT file found in those <short-isbn>directories    -   3. Verify that each non-empty chapter begins with a        FRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT. If it does not, then add one in place.    -   4. Convert the INT into a PSF file    -   5. Invoke ERetrieve to get the content, including SGML, ATR        files, and Associated Components for each line item in the PSF    -   6. Make UPM located at the beginning of the book into its own        chapter    -   7. Make UPM located at the end of the book into its own chapter    -   8. Make UPM located immediately before any chapter into its own        chapter    -   9. Renumber the PSF file to be well-formed        -   a) Uses the custom book ISBN number as the high-level digits        -   b) Sequence the sequence ids into the standard hierarchical            structure        -   c) Rename the pre-published content file names to match the            new sequence numbers        -   d) Rename the UPM content file names to match the new            sequence numbers    -   10. Move files into the e:pg<short-isbn>directory    -   11. Execute Product Generator

Product Specification File (PSF). For each INT file, a ProductSpecification File (PSF) is generated by EPGsetup. This file is named<short-ISBN>.INT and written to the PG Directory in a subdirectory named<short-ISBN>. The PSF is based upon the INT file from the RequestGenerator 32. The PSF has the following format:

PRODUCT:newisbn.00.00.00 FRONT_BACK_ELEMENT:newisbn.cc.ss.00FRONT_BACK_ELEMENT:newisbn.cc.ss.00 CHAPTER.C:newisbn.cc.00.00FRONT_BACK_ELEMENT:newisbn.cc.ss.00 SECTION:newisbn.cc.ss.00UPM_SECTION:newisbn.cc.ss.00 SECTION:newisbn.cc.ss.00CHAPTER.C:newisbn.cc.00.00 FRONT_BACK_ELEMENT:newisbn.cc.ss.00SECTION:newisbn.cc.ss.00 SECTION:newisbn.cc.ss.00FRONT_BACK_ELEMENT:newisbn.cc.ss.00 CHAPTER.C:newisbn.cc.00.00FRONT_BACK_ELEMENT:newisbn.cc.ss.00 SECTION:newisbn.cc.ss.00SECTION:newisbn.cc.ss.00 SECTION:newisbn.cc.ss.00FRONT_BACK_ELEMENT:newisbn.cc.ss.00where newisbn is the ISBN for the volume and cc is the chapter number,and ss is the section number. Chapter numbers should be sequentialwithin a volume and should start with 1. Section numbers should besequential within a chapter and should start with 1.

Product Override File (POF). During creation of a custom book, a usermay change the title of a pre-published chapter. If a volume containssuch a change, PG Setup will generate a Product Override File (POF) foreach volume to specify any overridden chapter titles. This file is named<short-ISBN>.POF and is written to the PG Directory in a subdirectorynamed <short-ISBN>. The POF references a line number of a chapter tagwithin the final PSF sent to Product Generator 36. The file has thefollowing format:

-   -   N:TITLE:xxxxxxxxx    -   N:TITLE:xxxxxxxxx        where N is the line number of the final PSF that contains the        chapter tag to override and xxxxxxxxx is the new title for that        chapter. For example, suppose the owner of the PSF below has        changed the title of Chapter 2 to “My Sample Chapter”. The POF        for achieving this result is shown below.

Product Specification File (PSF)  1 PRODUCT:0123456789.00.00.00  2FRONT_BACK_ELEMENT: 0123456789.01.01.00  3 FRONT_BACK_ELEMENT:0123456789.01.02.00  4 CHAPTER.C:0123456789.02.00.00  5FRONT_BACK_ELEMENT: 0123456789.02.01.00  6 SECTION: 0123456789.02.02.00 7 UPM_SECTION: 0123456789.02.03.00  8 SECTION: 0123456789.02.04.00  9CHAPTER.C:0123456789.03.00.00 10 FRONT_BACK_ELEMENT: 0123456789.03.01.0011 SECTION: 0123456789.03.02.00 12 SECTION: 0123456789.03.03.00 13FRONT_BACK_ELEMENT: 0123456789.03.04.00 14 CHAPTER.C:0123456789.04.00.0015 FRONT_BACK_ELEMENT: 0123456789.04.01.00 16 SECTION:0123456789.04.02.00 17 SECTION: 0123456789.04.03.00 18 SECTION:0123456789.04.04.00 19 FRONT_BACK_ELEMENT: 0123456789.04.05.00 20FRONT_BACK_ELEMENT: 0123456789.05.00.00

Pre-published Content. For each content element of type SECTION orFRONT_AND_BACK_ELEMENT, PG Setup calls eRetrieve to get the content andwrites a content file. This file is named <sequence id>.SGM and writtento the PG Directory in a subdirectory named <short-ISBN>. ERetrieve alsogets associated components and places them in the PG Directory in asubdirectory named <short-ISBN>/HiRes.

The present invention has been described with reference to a particularembodiment in order to facilitate the reader's understanding of itsbroader applications. It shall therefore be understood that the scope ofthe invention is not limited by the above disclosure, but is entitled tothe full breadth of the claims below. It shall also be appreciated thatcertain modifications to the methods and designs disclosed herein mayoccur to the skilled artisan without departing from the spirit and scopeof the invention as claimed.

1. A computer program storage device readable by a machine, tangiblyembodying a file structure for storing a content object, being one of abook, a collection of images, an album, a video and a multimedia object,capable of being produced by a processing system and having a pluralityof content entities to facilitate content adjustment, said filestructure comprising: an identifier file object containing a list ofcontent entity identifiers defining the content of the content object,wherein a hierarchial arrangement of the content entity identifierswithin the list includes at least one hierarchial tier and at least onesubordinate tier and corresponds to a user-defined content objecthierarchical structure, and wherein the content entity identifiers aredetermined by the processing system and placed in the list in responseto user selection of content entities for the content object; and aplurality of content file objects, each containing a content entityidentified by one of the content entity identifiers contained in saidlist, wherein the content entity identifiers each include identificationinformation identifying the content file object containing the contententity associated with that identifier; wherein the presence andposition of content entity identifiers within said list are modifiableby the user to alter content and arrangement of the content objectwithout manipulating the content entities identified by said contententity identifiers.
 2. The device of claim 1, wherein said filestructure further comprises an attribute file object containing at leastone attribute pertaining to the content object.
 3. The device of claim1, wherein at least one attribute is extracted from the content object.4. The device of claim 1, wherein ones of the content entities furthercomprise components associated with the content object, and said filestructure further comprises one or more associated component fileobjects.
 5. The device of claim 1, wherein the content object is a bookand ones of the content entities are one of volumes, chapters andsections.
 6. The device of claim 4, wherein at least one of theassociated components comprises an image.
 7. A computer program storagedevice readable by a machine, tangibly embodying a file structure forstoring a hierarchically structured content object, being one of a book,a collection of images, an album, a video and a multimedia object,capable of being produced by a processing system and having a pluralityof content entities to facilitate content adjustment, said filestructure comprising: an identifier file object containing a hierarchialoutline of containers and content entity identifiers defining thecontent and corresponding to a user-defined hierarchical structure ofthe content object, wherein each container represents an outlinehierarchial tier and includes at least one content entity identifierforming a subordinate outline hierarchical tier, and wherein the contententity identifiers are determined by the processing system and placed inthe outline in response to user selection of content entities for thecontent object; and a plurality of content file objects, each containinga content entity identified by one of the content entity identifierscontained in said outline, wherein the content entity identifiers eachinclude identification information identifying the content file objectcontaining the content entity associated with that identifier; whereinthe presence and position of containers and individual content entityidentifiers within said outline are modifiable by a user to altercontent and structure of the content object without manipulating thecontent entities identified by said content entity identifiers.
 8. Thedevice of claim 7, wherein said file structure further comprises anattribute file object containing at least one attribute pertaining tothe content object.
 9. The device of claim 7, wherein at least oneattribute is extracted from the content object.
 10. The device of claim7, wherein ones of the content entities further comprise componentsassociated with the content object, and said file structure furthercomprises one or more associated component file objects.
 11. The deviceof claim 7, wherein the content object is a book and the containers areone or more of a book, a volume, and a chapter.
 12. The device of claim7, wherein the content object is a book and ones of the content entitiesare one of volumes, chapters and sections.
 13. The device of claim 10,wherein at least one of the associated components comprises an image.14. A computer implemented method of producing a user work in the formof a content object, being one of a book, a collection of images, analbum, a video and a multimedia object, capable of being produced by aprocessing system and having a plurality of content entities eachincluding at least one medium, comprising the steps of: storing a listof content entity identifiers defining the content of the work within anidentifier file object, wherein a hierarchial arrangement of the contententity identifiers within the list includes at least one hierarchialtier and at least one subordinate tier and corresponds to a user-definedwork hierarchical structure, and wherein the content entity identifiersare determined by the processing system and placed in the list inresponse to user selection of content entities for the work; storing thecontent entities identified by the content entity identifiers within aplurality of content file objects with each content file objectcontaining a content entity identified by one of the content entityidentifiers contained in said list, wherein the content entityidentifiers each include identification information identifying thecontent file object containing the content entity associated with thatidentifier; and enabling modification of the presence and position ofcontent entity identifiers within said list by a user to alter contentand arrangement of the work without manipulating the content entitiesidentified by said content entity identifiers.
 15. The method of claim14, further comprising the step of storing at least one attributepertaining to the work in an attribute file object.
 16. The method ofclaim 14, wherein at least one attribute is extracted from the work. 17.The method of claim 14, wherein ones of the content entities furthercomprise components associated with the work, and further comprising thestep of storing the components in one or more associated component fileobjects.
 18. The method of claim 14, wherein the work is one of a book,a collection of images, an album, and a video.
 19. The method of claim17, wherein the work is a book and ones of the content entities are oneof volumes, chapters and sections.
 20. A computer implemented method ofproducing a user work in the form of a content object, being one of abook, a collection of images, an album, a video and a multimedia object,capable of being produced by a processing system and having a pluralityof content entities each including at least one medium, comprising thesteps of: storing a hierarchial outline of containers and content entityidentifiers defining the content and corresponding to a user-definedhierarchical structure of the work within an identifier file object,wherein each container represents an outline hierarchial tier andincludes at least one content entity identifier forming a subordinateoutline hierarchical tier, and wherein the content entity identifiersare determined by the processing system and placed in the outline inresponse to user selection of content entities for the work; storing thecontent entities identified by the content entity identifiers within aplurality of content file objects with each content file objectcontaining a content entity identified by one of the content entityidentifiers contained in said outline, wherein the content entityidentifiers each include identification information identifying thecontent file object containing the content entity associated with thatidentifier; and enabling modification of the presence and position ofcontainers and individual content entity identifiers within said outlineby a user to alter content and structure of the work withoutmanipulating the content entities identified by said content entityidentifiers.
 21. The method of claim 20, further comprising the step ofstoring at least one attribute pertaining to the work within anattribute file object.
 22. The method of claim 20, wherein at least oneattribute is extracted from the work.
 23. The method of claim 20,wherein ones of the content entities further comprise componentsassociated with the work, and further comprising the step of storing thecomponents in one or more associated component file objects.
 24. Themethod of claim 23, wherein the work is a book and the containers areone or more of a book, a volume, and a chapter.
 25. The method of claim20, wherein the work is a book and ones of the content entities are oneof volumes, chapters and sections.
 26. The method of claim 23, whereinat least one of the associated components comprises one of an image, avideo segment and an audio segment.
 27. A computer program storagedevice readable by a machine, tangibly embodying a program ofinstructions executable by the machine to perform method steps forproviding a file structure for storing a content object, being one of abook, a collection of images, an album, a video and a multimedia object,capable of being produced by a processing system and having a pluralityof content entities, comprising: a first set of program instructions forcreating an identifier file object containing a list of content entityidentifiers defining the content of the content object, wherein ahierarchial arrangement of the content entity identifiers within thelist includes at least one hierarchial tier and at least one subordinatetier and corresponds to a user-defined content object hierarchicalstructure, and wherein the content entity identifiers are determined bythe processing system and placed in the list in response to userselection of content entities for the content object; and a second setof program instructions for creating a plurality of content fileobjects, each containing a content entity identified by one of thecontent entity identifiers contained in said list, wherein the contententity identifiers each include identification information identifyingthe content file object containing the content entity associated withthat identifier; wherein the presence and position of content entityidentifiers within said list are modifiable by a user to alter contentand arrangement of the content object without manipulating the contententities identified by said content entity identifiers.
 28. The deviceof claim 27, further comprising a third set of program instructions forcreating an attribute file object containing at least one attributepertaining to the content object.
 29. The device of claim 27, wherein atleast one attribute is extracted from the content object.
 30. The deviceof claim 27, wherein ones of the content entities further comprisecomponents associated with the content object, and further comprising athird set of program instructions for creating one or more associatedcomponent file objects.
 31. The device of claim 27, wherein the contentobject is a book and ones of the content entities are one of volumes,chapters and sections.
 32. The device of claim 30, wherein at least oneof the associated components comprises one of an image, a video segment,and an audio segment.
 33. A computer program storage device readable bya machine, tangibly embodying a program of instructions executable bythe machine to perform method steps for storing a hierarchicallystructured content object, being one of a book, a collection of images,an album, a video and a multimedia object, capable of being produced bya processing system and having a plurality of content entities,comprising: a first set of program instructions for creating anidentifier file object containing a hierarchial outline of containersand content entity identifiers defining the content and corresponding toa user-defined hierarchical structure of the content object, whereineach container represents an outline hierarchial tier and includes atleast one content entity identifier forming a subordinate outlinehierarchical tier, and wherein the content entity identifiers aredetermined by the processing system and placed in the outline inresponse to user selection of content entities for the content object;and a second set of program instructions for creating a plurality ofcontent file objects, each containing a content entity identified by oneof the content entity identifiers contained in said outline, wherein thecontent entity identifiers each include identification informationidentifying the content file object containing the content entityassociated with that identifier; wherein the presence and position ofcontainers and individual content entity identifiers within said outlineare modifiable by a user to alter content and structure of the contentobject without manipulating the content entities identified by saidcontent entity identifiers.
 34. The device of claim 33, furthercomprising a third set of program instructions for creating an attributefile object containing at least one attribute pertaining to the contentobject.
 35. The device of claim 33, wherein at least one attribute isextracted from the content object.
 36. The device of claim 33, whereinones of the content entities further comprise components associated withthe content object, and further comprising a third set of programinstructions for creating one or more associated component file objects.37. The device of claim 33, wherein the content object is a book and thecontainers are one or more of a book, a volume, and a chapter.
 38. Thedevice of claim 33, wherein the content object is a book and ones of thecontent entities are one of volumes, chapters and sections.
 39. Thedevice of claim 36, wherein at least one of the associated componentscomprises one of an image, a video segment and an audio segment.